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My gaze shoots to Ree, and I wish like hell I could ask her what I should say. We had an agreement. Me telling Sanaa and Evander about us is going back on what we talked about; it’s giving her mom information she’s also not ready for her to have yet.

Goddamn it. Why couldn’t I keep my hands to myself?

“Tell them, Oakley,” Sanaa says. “I can’t believe this. How could you do this to Serena? And right under her nose. You’re family to us. Our son and you do this to—”

“I know, Mama,” Ree interrupts, and all three of us whip our heads in her direction. She knows we’re not together, obviously, but she doesn’t know about Des and me…does she?

“What do you mean? I don’t understand,” Sanaa asks.

“I’m going to need someone to explain what’s going on right now,” Evander demands.

“Oakley and I are separated.” Ree scoots over and stands by me, creating a united front, the one we’ve always been, but I don’t know why she’s doing it now when she has to know Des is the person I’ve been seeing, and I never told her. I never even told her I’m bisexual.

“What do you mean you’re separated?” Sanaa asks, her tears giving way to confusion.

“We separated right before Christmas last year. It’s one of the reasons I went to Ohio alone to see you.”

“Because Oakley is gay?” she asks.

“What?” Evander rejoins the conversation.

“I’m not gay. I’m bisexual, and that has nothing to do with why Ree and I separated. We’re just…”

“Not in love with each other anymore,” she finishes for me. “I’m the one who asked for the separation. I love Oakley, I will always love Oakley, but we’d already broken up before I found out I was pregnant. We got back together because of the baby, and I’ll never regret that decision—”

“Me either,” I interrupt, then reach down and grab her hand.

“But we’re not endgame. I want Oakley to always be in my life, but…I want to know what it’s like to really be in love, to date, to see what’s out there, and I want him to have that opportunity too. He just found it with Desmond a lot quicker than we anticipated.”

I turn to her, appreciation filling my chest, making it impossible to feel anything else in this moment. I should have told her about myself before, about Des. I should have known Ree would always have my back. “I didn’t plan for this to happen with Des.”

“Why didn’t you tell us?” Evander seems to have found his voice before Sanaa.

“We weren’t ready for anyone to know. And I think we both felt like—”

“Like we failed,” I interrupt. “Like we were letting people we loved down. And for me, I don’t ever want T to think I would leave her.”

That seems to hit a button in Sanaa. “You’re not your mom, Oakley. We all know that. Tiana knows that. You would never leave that little girl.”

My eyes sting. I needed to hear that from her. More than I realized. “Thank you. And I’m so damn sorry you had to see that, sorry you found out that way. There’s a part of me that worries I’m going to lose you because of this.” My gaze bounces from Sanaa to Evander. “Both of you, and I just—”

“You’re not going to lose us, son,” Evander says, before Sanaa continues.

“You’re family. You and Serena realizing you’re not meant to be together won’t change that, though I have to admit, I would have liked not to walk in on you and Desmond that way. Not that I have a problem with it, because I don’t. I want you to be happy, but this was a hell of a way to find out.”

I close my eyes, wishing I could go back and have made a better decision, but I can’t, so I need to be strong and face my mistake. “You’re right. I’m sorry. You deserved better than that.” I turn my gaze to Ree. “You all do.”

Because she’s sticking up for me. She’s pretending I told her about Des when I didn’t, but somehow she already knew.

“It’s okay.” Sanaa steps forward. “I know who you are.” And then she pulls me into a hug. I nearly collapse against her, so thankful that my relationship with her won’t change, thankful that I’ll still have her as a mom.

The four of us sit and talk for a while. They ask questions that Ree and I don’t know the answers to yet, partially because we hadn’t planned to do this yet and also because we haven’t talked about Des.

“Since the baby is upstairs sleeping, why don’t the two of you go ahead and go home? She can stay the night with us. You can figure out what you’re doing or if the plan has changed.” Sanaa’s eyes are glassy again, as though she might cry. My heart breaks for her, for what seeing me with Des that way did to her, but I’m so thankful for her at the same time.

“Thanks, Mom. That would be great.” Serena pulls her mom into a hug, the two of them speaking in hushed whispers just for them.

I turn to Evander, unsure how to react, but he pulls me to him as well. “You’ll always be family to us, Oakley. Come on, man. You have to know that.”