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She shouldn’t interfere. She should leave well enough alone. But she could tell that Dex had mixed feelings about his mother. It wouldn’t hurt to hear what she wanted, though Ashley could probably guess. It was what every mom wanted.
To make sure her child was safe.
Was that what Ruby O’Malley had craved all those years ago? A stable place to live, a job to pay their way, a man to take care of her?
Ashley knew about those wants. But she didn’t need a man, at least not to take care of her.
“I can get my own but maybe we can talk?” Ruby’s voice was thick with so much need it made Ashley’s heart crack.
Ashley picked up her tea and took a seat in the same booth where she and Jerome had shared their first and only date. A couple of minutes later, Ruby came over with a small cup of her own. Fellow tea drinkers. Perhaps it was a sign.
“The tea at the diner isn’t as good as this. They only have Lipton.”
“Do you like working there?”
“I do. The boss isn’t a jerk, the other waitresses are friendly. Nice customers, too, especially the boys from the hockey team.”
Ashley hadn’t thought about that. “They eat there regularly? What about Dex?”
“He came in with them a couple of times, but no more. Avoiding me.” She swallowed and picked up the string of the tea bag to dunk it. “How is he?”
Ruby could see that he was healthy, strong, amazing at how he earned his living. But that wasn’t what she was asking.
“He’s trying his best to figure things out. It gave him a shock to see you and he doesn’t know what to do with it. He’s still carrying a lot of pain.”
She nodded slowly, thinking her next words through, like she needed to impress Ashley, the connection to the boy she’d lost. “I saw that he got hurt in that game. Is he okay?”
“Yeah, just a goose egg and a bruise. He’s made of stern stuff.” Ashley decided to jump in feet first. “You moved here to be close to him?”
“I’d been here a couple of months, trying to get up the courage to see him. He was in the news and I wanted to reach out, but he had so much going on in his life. Complicated stuff, and I didn’t want to make it worse. I’d just started the job and a few weeks later, he walked into the diner with one of his teammates and sat at the counter. I was so nervous I threw up in the restroom, and then when I came out, there he was right in front of me. And his face, when he …” Her eyes welled up. “Oh, he wasn’t happy, not at all. But even though I was causing him pain, it was still the best feeling in the world. To finally be close to him again.” She shook her head. “It’s selfish of me, I know. You probably don’t understand.”
“I’m a mom as well.”
She looked up, her expression hopeful. “You are?”
“A nine-year-old girl. She’s amazing, the best of me and her father. We’re divorced. So I understand how you’re feeling. That joy and pain is unique to motherhood.”
She frowned. “Except I don’t deserve to feel the joy part. Not after everything I put him through.”
Dex was there, too. There would always be a cloud, no matter how successful he was.
“Could you tell me a little bit about what’s going on with you now?”
She hesitated.
“It would help to know what your life is like.”
“You want to know if I’m clean? I am. Fourteen months. I wanted to be sober for a year before I came … here.”
Before she came for her boy.
She held Ashley’s gaze, her intent a burning focus. “Are you two together?”
“Yes.” It sounded so good to say it.
“And he told you? About me?”
“Well, he had to after what happened at the shelter.” He didn’t have to say a thing, but he shared that with her. And more, later.
