Page 74 of Legs

“If I’m here so you can give me crap for what I did two years ago, I’m leaving. It sucks you’re still messed up, but I don’t have to sit through this.”

No, she didn’t. I didn’t want to extend this conversation any longer than needed, either. “What did you mean we both wanted something from each other?”

She cocked her head, the look on her face incredulous. “You really are clueless about yourself. As stubborn and as blind as your father ever was.”

“Tell me what you really think.”

She rolled her eyes at my sarcasm. “You used me as much as I used you, Jimmy. All you ever wanted was attention from your father, and if he wouldn’t give you affection, the next best thing was his anger. You wanted to marry me to get back at him. If you’d had the winery, I may have dealt with it. But why would I tie myself to a man with no prospects when it was clear I was a means to an end?”

I slumped in my chair, the wind sucked clean out of my lungs. A means to an end. I’d thought as much when recalling her treatment of me, and I couldn’t even deny her accusation. The night of the rainstorm, when Rachel and I had almost split up, she’d asked if I’d proposed to Sophia to aggravate my father. I wasn’t willing to listen then, cutting our conversation short.

I was all ears today.

I replayed my glee when telling my father about Sophia. How his face had purpled. How he’d made the time to talk—yell—at me weekly, trying to convince me to break things off. I’d reveled in it.

Marrying Sophia would have been the biggest mistake of my life, and if I’d still had the winery, that’s exactly what would have happened.

Losing it had saved me from that fate. My father had saved me from it.

I scrubbed my face, then shook my head. “I really fucked up.”

Sophia didn’t ask if I was referring to her or Rachel or my father. I was guilty, in some part, of sabotaging each relationship. With Rachel, the blame was mine alone.

“Anyway,” Sophia said, “is there anything else? I need to get going.”

Nothing, unless you included the mountain of apologies I owed Rachel, and the uncomfortable conversation I’d be having with my parents. “That’s it. And I’m sorry for my part in things. For not being honest with myself or you. I hope you’re happy.” Any enmity I’d harbored vanished. We were two people with a tangled past, good memories and bad. Good choices and bad. Chances were, if we hadn’t gone through the wringer, I might never have met Rachel.

Sophia held up her hand and wiggled her ring finger shamelessly. “Life is great.”

I chuckled. At least she owned who she was.

Next up were my parents.

* * *

Their apartment building was clean and bright, the lobby filled with Turkish carpets, beveled mirrors, and Renaissance paintings. I gave my name to the concierge, who waved me along. By the time I got to their door, my resolve faltered. Two years was a long time to break contact, the chip on my shoulder practically cemented in place. Still, I had to start somewhere, find a way to open a discussion. Considering the contest fiasco, probably best if I began there.

My mother answered after the first knock. “Jimmy.” Her dark eyes watered, and guilt suffocated me. Exactly why I’d avoided her all this time. One look was all it took.

But I was far from alone in what had gone down between us.

I’d texted her yesterday, asking for a meeting, and she’d replied in seconds. Now neither of us spoke. She didn’t comment on my T-shirt or ratty jeans or ink, and I didn’t tell her she still looked beautiful. Her hands lifted, like she wanted to hug me, then she stepped back.

I’d never have imagined my parents in a city apartment, but there was a wall of windows and high ceilings. Plants filled a space next to a desk. I’d figured they’d spend their retirement on the vineyard—my father’s dream. But my mother had grown up in the city and missed the action and people. Looked like he put someone else first, for once.

My gaze shifted to the painting to my right. It hung alone, a light shining from above, highlighting rows of vines stretching into the distance. It wasn’t particularly good. Crude, really, the perspective slightly off, muddy colors in the foreground. I’d painted it in high school and now it hung in their hall.

The urge to offer my mother that hug pulled at me. Instead I walked past her. Each thunk of my boots on their white floor echoed, the only other sound the swish and crinkle of a newspaper being read. My father. He’d lost more hair and looked thinner, his button-down creasing over protruding shoulders. Probably those hours at the gym.

“George.” My mother passed me and sat in the chair beside his, helping fold his paper. “Jimmy’s here.”

I didn’t imagine my visit was a surprise, but my father looked at me like I was a guest, someone interrupting his reading time. Already, I wanted to scream. Rail at him for never giving me attention. Never loving me like a father should love a son.

Tamping down my anger, I sunk into the white couch opposite them, legs apart, arms crossed. We stared at one another.

And I couldn’t take it. They didn’t get to sit here in their perfect apartment, with my painting on their wall, smothering me in silent guilt when they were as much to blame for our fallout as me. If one of us had to be the adult in this situation, looked like it was on me to buck up.

“I joined a contest a couple months back, that sommelier thing the Adriano brothers organized. Rachel and I got to know each other through it, but the real reason I was there was to leak the Cabernet issue. To tell critics you’ve been mislabeling wines.”