Page 106 of Flirting with 40

“Um . . . what are you doing here?” I ask as I stand at the door and stare after her. I still have my scrub pants on, but my shirt off, and I have a half-drank beer in my hand.

“I told you I had to come back for Aunt Millie’s surgery. Don’t worry”—she looks over her shoulder—“I’m not staying here.” She stops in her tracks and looks down the hallway and then back to me, eyes wide, and mouth open in shock. “I’m not interrupting anything am I?”

It takes me a second to get her gist. “No. God. Mom.” I sigh her name out. “The only thing you’re interrupting is my five precious hours of sleep. I’m so tired I couldn’t even do that if I tried.”

“Do that?” She giggles as she rounds the countertop and looks in my bowl before heading to the fridge. “It’s called sex, honey, and I’m more than aware you have it.”

“This conversation is wrong on so many levels.” I sink down into my seat and resume eating. It’s cold now, but I don’t have the energy to make anything different.

But when I look up, my mom is already cutting up lettuce and tomatoes and making a salad. “You need veggies,” she says. “All those carbs aren’t healthy.”

“Thanks for the nutrition lesson,” I grumble.

“Would you rather we chat about why you’ve been avoiding my calls?” she asks as if she’s Mary Freaking Poppins.

“I’ve been working. I’m not back on call yet, but like I told you, I’m helping Schultz out—trying to get in his good graces—and you know how much I love doing mindless bullshit.”

“Mindless, yes, but at least you aren’t pulling twenty-four-hour shifts.”

“I kind of am, though, trying to get my body back in the swing of things on the off chance I get reinstated soon.”

“It must be why you’re a bowl full of sunshine.”

I glare at her. “Why are you here?”

“You’re avoiding me.”

She’s right. I am.

“No, I’m not.”

“You never ignore my texts.” I give her one of those you-have-to-be-kidding-me looks. “Well, you ignore them but not this way.”

“And what way is that?” I ask around a bite of pasta.

“In the way where you don’t give me an inkling of how your camping trip went.”

“Is that why you’re here?” I laugh. “You want to get in my business?”

Christ.

“That Glam girl you went with. What’s her name again?”

My eyes flash up. Narrow. “What do you mean Glam girl?”

“I was checking your Instagram and saw someone tag you from your retreat. It said something about it being Glam and all kinds of those weird pound sign things after it.”

“Hashtags.”

“Yes. Those. I always forget their new name.”

“That’s beside the point. Your stalking, meddling . . . annoying abilities really need to take a back seat.”

“I wasn’t stalking. I just happened to see it.” She waves a hand at me. “What was her name again?”

“Who? You mean, Blakely?”

“Yes. Such a pretty name. And talk about beautiful. Classic and sophisticated looking all at the same time.”