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“Eww.”

“Takes my breath away every time.”

“Pop, you gotta stop talking about Mom that way.”

He slaps his hand on my shoulder as we get to the car. “Fair enough.” He strides in front of me, takes the bags out of my mom’s hands, and kisses her. She smiles into the kiss and then gets a little flush in her cheeks. I’ve seen them do this a million times, but for some reason, today, it makes me a little sad. I hustle the rest of the bags into the kitchen.

“Thanks, honey. It’s nice to have you here.”

I kiss her on her still flushed cheek. “It’s good to be here. What can I help with?”

“Didn’t know you could cook.”

“I couldn’t until we started staying home and kind of learning together.”

My mom doesn’t turn back to me but says, “We? Interesting. I hope I meet this we someday.”

I roll my eyes. “Knock it off, Mom.”

“Go finish your beer. I got this. It’s just steak and snap beans.” She plunks a produce bag of green beans into a colander and starts rinsing them. I head out back where my dad is simply staring at my mom through the window over the sink. She returns his gaze. This is all a lesson that’s not lost on me, but not sure what it accomplishes. I’m not my dad.

“Son.”

“Dad.”

He turns his attention to me with a whole new demeanor. Almost like I’m going to get a lecture on the importance of civility, which I often got as a kid.

“I’ve never inserted myself into your narrative.”

“Elaborate, please.”

“Your love life. I’ve never said anything about your love life. And—”

“Dad. I don’t want to hear this.”

“Well, too fucking bad.”

My eyes pop open. He rarely swears. I sit up straighter and brace myself for whatever he has to say.

“I didn’t say anything while that girl chipped away at who we knew our son to be. We wrote it off as a phase. That every man and woman needs to go through bad relationships to get to good ones. We never dreamed it was such a nightmare.”

“Dad, look—”

He interrupts me in a stern tone, “Sit there and listen. That girl stole a piece of you, and by the time we were able to see it clearly, you were so entrenched we didn’t know what to do. We didn’t see how she emotionally and physically manipulated you until it was almost too late. Thank God for your sister pulling you out of there. I thought for sure you’d break up after one of your mom and Charlotte’s confrontations.”

“What?” I’m alarmed by this. No one ever told me.

“They fought all the time towards the end. She’d call and taunt your mother. She held you hostage, basically. Our ransom was silence. She’d threaten if we intervened again, we wouldn’t see you for the holidays or any break. And that’s what happened.”

“You act like I was in a cult.”

“Toward the end, as she tattered your self-confidence and took away every piece of your life, we acted, as you know. We pulled you away from her so you could see the forest for the trees. But you made it your responsibility to make her sane or whole.”

“You gave up your career to be with mom. I thought I had to sacrifice myself for love, as well. I know it wasn’t the same thing, but in my brain, at the time, it’s how I justified it all.”

I’ve never really said this to anyone. Not even Tess. Or even me. My father looks like he’s been punched in the gut. He reaches out and puts his hand on my arm.

“Please tell me you know the difference between the situations now. I didn’t want another life. I wanted to build one with your mother. She never asked me to give up my career. She offered to give up hers and travel with me. I never felt as if I lost out on anything because of what I gained in life. That woman, you kids, the grandkids, this deck, my friends. I love my job. I love everything about it, sure it’s vastly different from the one I set out to have, but there’s not a part of me that would want a different life. That girl wanted to take all of you because she had nothing. You know she’s been in and out of treatment centers for the last decade?”