“Alex, this isn’t you. You don’t have these sorts of neurotic insecurities. Where is this coming from?”
Josie, he thought.
“Hell if I know,” he shrugged. “Between the tough case at work and screwing everything up with Josie, I feel like the person I’ve been all these years just got a personality transplant. I don’t like questioning myself. It feels uncertain and chaotic.”
“That’s called growth.”
“Then growing sucks.”
Meribeth pulled back, brow creased with worry. “This is about Josie, isn’t it?”
“And work. And Grandpa.”
She waved her hand dismissively. “Everyone has missteps at work.”
“But I—”
“Alex!” A harsh tone came through in his hissed name. “You’re doing the grown-up equivalent of pouting when things don’t go your way. It’s really unappealing, especially on a twenty-eight-year-old professional.”
Ouch.
Right or wrong, the comment hurt. Mostly because she was right.
“A baby landed in the NICU and my professional judgment was called into question, Mom. It’s not like I’m moping because Josie wouldn’t go to the homecoming dance with me.”
“Separate the two. Which one hurts more?”
Zing!
“I don’t know.”
She reached across the table and felt his forehead. “Are you ill? Because my Alex doesn’t say ‘I don’t know’ when the answer is in front of his face. Heck, the answer could be doing a lap dance for as obvious as it is.”
“Mom!”
“You’re in love with Josie and you made a mistake.” She took a long sip of tea.
“I’m not—”
“Oh, look at the pasties!”
“The metaphor is overdone. Point taken,” he said through gritted teeth.
“I am going to guess you didn’t share what’s going on at work with her.”
He set his tea cup down with a resigned sigh. “You know, in the 1500s that ability of yours led to dunkings. Who is my real dad? A warlock?”
Meribeth howled with laughter, turning heads. “That’s the old Alex.” His comment about his “real dad” shook her, though—her certainty in dealing with him as if he were a petulant schoolboy had drained out of her. Good.
“Josie grew up without a dad, too. At least, from the age of eleven on.”
Meribeth frowned. “He took off?”
“Died. Car accident.”
“Oh, how awful.” In her trademark gesture, his mother put her splayed palm over her heart. “And her mother?”
He shook his head, picking up the tepid tea absentmindedly, forcing himself to drink it. “She didn’t talk much about her. I get the impression it’s not a good relationship.”
“Two fatherless adults trying to navigate your first real relationship.”
“Great, Mom. How high concept of you. You should pitch screenplays to Hollywood.”
She laughed, putting her hands up like a director setting a scene. “Hot ambitious doctor meets fatherless, ambitious nurse—”
“Hot, Mom?” He cocked an eyebrow and tried to suppress an embarrassed grimace.
“Where did you meet again?” Meribeth asked.
“At her friend’s birth.”
“As her friend crosses over into motherhood.” Meribeth scowled. “At her birth? Why didn’t I know this?”
“You never asked.”
“You picked someone up at a birth?”
“I’m not proud of it.”
“Her best friend’s birth?”
“Yes.”
“Your timing is…interesting. Most women would be in the room, supporting their friend.”
“The dads were there to handle that.”
“Did you just say ‘dads’? As in plural?”
“Yes.” Oh, shit. This was headed into territory he didn’t want to have to explain. Then again, it took the heat off him, so maybe he should go with it. Too bad the restaurant didn’t have a liquor license. He could use a beer or ten right now.
“Her best friend slept with two different men and they don’t know who the biological father is?”
“It’s…complicated, Mom.”
“Sounds intriguing.” She leaned forward and propped her chin in her hand. “And Josie’s friends with this woman and the dads?”
“Yes.”
“Anyone that open-minded is someone I should meet.”
“It’s a little late for that,” he said, blowing a puff of air out, trying to relax his granite shoulders. “She’s done with me. I made a horrible comment and questioned her professional ethics when she told me Grandpa needed a second opinion.”
“She was right.”
“I know.” His aunt had received a call this week—the trial was broken due to overwhelming evidence in favor of the drug. Josie had been right.
“We took Dad back in, but Josie’s gone,” Meribeth said.
“Gone?”
“They said she’s no longer employed there.”
Ice water ran through his body. Did that mean she quit? Was she fired? Had she crossed some ethical or legal lines?
“That’s all they said?”
“Yes.” Her turn to start with the one-word answers.
Rubbing his chin, he felt two days of stubble scratch against his palm. “And the new medication?”
“Dad will go on it soon. We just don’t know.” She shrugged.
“So Josie was right and I f**ked everything up.”
“Everything we do can be undone.”
“Not this, Mom.”
“Everything. If you want it bad enough.” The look on her face was a blend of compassion and amusement, as if the eighteen years between them conferred some deep wisdom on her that he couldn’t access. He wanted to believe it was true, but in recent years he’d come to see that she was just as human as he was, and that it was her compassion and deep devotion to him that mattered more than any perceived wisdom. Right now he just needed someone to listen. And he knew he could always turn to her because she was, after all, Mom.
When would he let another woman in like that?
“I do.”
“That’s what you say at a wedding.”
He groaned.
“You left yourself wide open.” She chuckled.
No. I didn’t. And that’s the problem.