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“Right, and I love him. That was why I also asked him what he was doing for Christmas, since he’s been avoiding that topic. He said that I didn’t need to worry about it.”

“Why?” I asked. I tried not to open my lips very far in order to prevent the cold air from getting into my mouth.

“The answer was another weird thing. Apparently, he’s going on vacation. He said he’s tired of the winter weather and he wants some sun, so he’s taking the money that I paid him for the piano and heading to a beach somewhere.”

“Does he travel much?”

“I can’t remember the last time he went any farther than Ann Arbor for a football game. No, he doesn’t travel,” he said. “I’m glad, though. It’s good for him to get out and do something different.”

It was a good thing for him, for sure. I had been planning to go to his house to help him celebrate, so he wouldn’t have been alone. But now, I wouldn’t need to do that. Instead, I would have my mom and Maël.

“Did you just groan?” Oliver asked. “Are you all right?” He slowed down more until we were walking.

“I have a headache,” I admitted. “I didn’t sleep very well.” The noise-canceling earbuds hadn’t been good enough, and the noise-canceling construction techniques of the Milaflores Building didn’t include the bedroom doors. I had heard way too much and I had also decided that I really didn’t like the blow-up mattress. That was why I had bought the new bed for myself, but I hadn’t gotten to use it.

“What’s your mom doing here?” he asked.

“That’s a good question. It’s always hard to get information out of her,” I said.

“Maybe she just wanted to visit her daughter for the holidays,” he suggested.

“No, definitely not. I haven’t seen her for years, not around the holidays or at any other time. I was trying to remember our last visit together and I think it was at the photoshoot. It was the one we did for the article in the art magazine, the feature on my grandparents,” I explained. “That was the summer before I started eighth grade at boarding school.”

“It’s been that long?”

I nodded again. “After that, she was always busy and she said that I chose to live in places that she had no desire to visit.”

“Interesting.”

I glanced up and saw him frowning. “It wasn’t nice of her. I was lonely when I first went to school, sad and kind of lost,” I said. “I asked if she would come but she told me that I needed to get used to being there, since I had made the choice to go. She was pretty angry about the situation.”

“I could tell that she was mad from her quotes in that article in the art magazine. She talked about how improper intervention from grandparents could crush souls. I looked up your family and read it,” he explained. “I looked at those pictures from the photoshoot, too, but I didn’t see any of you.”

“No, they didn’t include any of shots with me. I think it was because the article ended up being negative and they were shielding a child.”

“I would say that it was more of an exposé,” he responded. “Nobody came out looking good, not your grandparents or your mother.”

“It turned out that my lack of education was the least of what they needed to worry about.” The reporter had asked my grandparents all kinds of questions about the shady practices they employed when loaning out their art to exhibitions and the unreported income from kickbacks that they received. She had also questioned them about persistent rumors that they had allowed their daughter (my mom) to party with inappropriate people (older perverts), beginning at a ridiculously young age (twelve). They’d tried to dodge her inquiries into unhappy and mistreated employees, and had attempted to explain the ridiculous number of flights they took on their private jet for ridiculously short distances.

“Was it all true?” he asked.

“I think so. They wanted to sue and they threatened to, but they never did. It’s only libel if it’s lies.” I wiped cold rain off my face with my glove. “The parts about my mom were the worst. It’s no wonder that she acts like she does now, with how unstable her background was. And it made sense that she was always so careful about me and her male friends, when her parents let her get hurt.”

“That was terrible to read.” He also wiped his face on his sleeve. “How long is she planning to stay with you?”

“I have the same information that you do, unfortunately,” I answered. “You heard me trying to question her and her boyfriend over dinner. She wouldn’t say anything pertinent and Maël won’t say anything at all. I haven’t heard him speak one word, but I have heard him vocalize so I think he has the ability. He may not want to, which is his right.” I’d had many moments of my own when I didn’t want to be verbal.

“I always thought my family was strange,” he commented. “My dad not getting along with his father, my gramps knowing old rock stars, my sister always getting bothered by modeling agencies.”

“Is she? It makes sense.” They were all so attractive!

“She was never interested,” he told me. “As I got older, I started hearing more from my friends about their parents, and I was shocked. There were plenty of people who didn’t love their mom and dad, for example.”

“There are people who don’t know who their dads are, like me,” I offered. “People who didn’t go to school and were involved in a project called ‘Crochet the World for Peace,’ when no one knew how to crochet. I wish I knew what particular strange thing has led my mom to my apartment. I didn’t even think she knew where I lived! I mean, I told her, but she never writes anything down.”

“Kat, are you sure that you’re safe there? With that guy?” he asked me. “When I asked him if he was done with his dessert last night, he growled.”

“I trust that my mom wouldn’t bring someone dangerous into my house. Although…” I took a few more steps, thinking about what she’d said regarding Maël. “I’ve never heard her talk about a man like she does about him. Like, that he’d take care of her, that he would watch over her. She always wanted to do her own thing, even with Daisuke.”