Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 77579 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 388(@200wpm)___ 310(@250wpm)___ 259(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77579 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 388(@200wpm)___ 310(@250wpm)___ 259(@300wpm)
She’d told him that she just wanted the place to feel more homey.
He’d raged that she might be okay with raising a pussy, but he’d be damned if his son liked that girly shit. And, well, he’d gone off from there into really fucking homophobic territory, ranting and raving until Ma was crying and pulling down the curtains.
Now, though, every goddamn trace of my old man was gone. In their places were things that screamed my mom.
Lots of pinks and florals, too many throw pillows, curtains on the windows. She’d even gutted the kitchen and replaced all the appliances, every light fixture in each room, and the primary bathroom was practically a spa, complete with a towel warmer and a TV.
“Honey!” she called, rushing toward me with outstretched arms. “I’m so glad you could make it,” she said, grabbing both of my hands, and giving them a squeeze, very aware that, for the most part, I didn’t like being hugged, that I never easily accepted physical contact. She used to try to press it when I was still a kid, until a friend of hers told her that she needed to respect my boundaries.
To be fair, I wouldn’t call them my boundaries.
I’d called them the walls my father had forced me to build.
And I’d never really figured out how to break them down myself.
“Food smells great,” I told her, offering her the flowers I’d brought.
I hadn’t been sure about them. But Miko had talked me into it. Hell, he’d been the one to take the phone out of my hand when I’d been starting to feed my ma an excuse about why I couldn’t come for lunch, then reminded me that I was supposed to be trying to make amends. And that my mother was trying to make that happen by feeding me.
“Oh, you remembered!” she said, sniffing the Calla lilies.
Of course I remembered.
It was another argument from my childhood.
Calla lilies on the dining room table. My father coming home in a mood—because he was always in a mood—and zeroing in on them.
“You putting fucking funeral flowers on my dining table?” he’d roared, and I remembered distinctly the way my ma had shrank away from him immediately, knowing what was coming. “The fuck you doing spending my money on fucking flowers anyway?”
At some point, he’d picked up the glass pitcher, and hurled it at the wall, missing Ma by all of six inches.
Every time I’d visited since his death, though, she always had some around.
“Come, sit,” she said, waving at the island, then going to the other side, stirring something on the stove. “How have you been?”
“I’m good, Ma. Just been busy. Trying to put shit to rights,” I added.
“I heard that you’re… protecting a woman,” she said, tone careful as she turned away to look at what was in the oven. I knew she wanted to pry. But she was being careful because she knew how hard it was to get me to talk about, well, fucking anything.
It was just starting to occur to me how fucking sad that was.
“I am,” I confirmed.
“Oh?” she asked, brow raised, but she was pretending only to be partially interested as she wiped down the already clean counter. “What is she like?” she asked.
“Determined. Hardworking. Really dedicated to her family business and to her aging grandfather.”
“That’s nice. Is she pretty?” she asked.
“She’s gorgeous,” I said, watching as her eyes lit up.
I wasn’t stupid.
I saw the way she fawned over the babies and kids in the family. She wanted to be a grandma like all the other moms from her generation. Unfortunately for her, both her sons were cold, detached assholes who had almost no hope of finding spouses and procreating.
Admittedly, I’d never even given it a thought before.
Suddenly, though, I was wondering about it.
If I didn’t marry and have kids, what would the next forty years look like? More of this? Working nonstop. Casual sex. Occasionally seeing my family.
That didn’t seem like something worth aspiring to.
At least not anymore.
I was going to go ahead and not wonder the reason for the sudden change.
“Really? What’s her name?”
“Halle.”
“Oh, that’s a pretty name. What is her family business?”
“Antiques,” I told her.
She asked several more questions about Halle that only made me want to cut this meal short, shirk all my afternoon work responsibilities, and go back to my place to get into bed with her, and watch her ride me.
Just when she was taking the stuffed shells out of the oven, though, the door opened.
And in walked fucking Silvano.
“Hey, Ma, you think about… the fuck is he doing here?” he asked, his cold gaze landing on me.
“Boys, can we not?” Ma asked, sighing hard. “I just want one nice meal with both of my boys for a change. Is that too much to ask?”
“No,” I said, shaking my head.