Maybe it was something in him.
He wasn’t sure why he had felt so driven to take her to his childhood apartment.
But it had felt important.
So, he had done it.
But it had opened up a lot of uncomfortable avenues of conversation around his mother, and he found he wanted to put a wall back up afterward.
There were things that she wanted from him that mystified him. Things that he had a deep resistance toward giving.
She wanted him to be proud of himself, is what it felt like. Every time she said he’d done good things for his siblings.
She wanted him to admit that he had anger at his mother. She hadn’t said that, but he could feel it.
And every time it came up, he just told her that he wasn’t angry at her.
He wasn’t.
But she had brought up that memory of being home fromschool, sick, and her making him the beanie weenies, and it was such a strange, uncomfortable memory.
Because he could remember lying in bed, completely congested, eating a meal he couldn’t even taste, and wondering why – if she could do this now – she couldn’t do it all the time. Or even two days a week. If she was capable of caring for him like this, then why didn’t she?
It was such a weird, angry thing, and he just didn’t want to contend with it.
Didn’t want to acknowledge it.
Didn’t want to give it strength or power in his life.
But today, Marlowe, Cara, Zane, Nolan, Walker, and Lila were coming to his place for a barbecue. Marlowe was fussing about like she was one of the hosts, talking about drinks and ice and all manner of things, and it made him feel happy and on edge all at once.
They stayed with each other most nights of the week, so he could see how it felt like something she was somewhat responsible for.
Except it also made him feel some other, uncomfortable things. That was the Marlowe Davis experience, he supposed.
As good as things were with them in bed, as much as he enjoyed her company, there was always a degree of discomfort.
Always a degree of her pushing when he wanted her to stop.
He wasn’t a man who was afraid of hard things.
He never had been.
He had always pushed forward, pushed ahead in life, like when he had decided to become a cowboy. Because he wasn’t going to allow his father to have the final say.
But Marlowe pushed at sore spots that he liked to leave alone.
And he found himself reluctant to tell her to leave them alone.
Even if he couldn’t say why.
“My real worry is that we’re not going to have enough beer,” she said.
“It doesn’t seem like we drink that much,” he said.
“I didn’t mean it as a negative.”
“I know,” he said.
