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“How’d your appointment go?” Battle asks.
“Same as it always does,” she mocks Battle.
“I hope you were polite to Mrs. Kay?” he mocks her back.
“Always. Come on, Bean, we have to go. James is waitin’,” she shouts.
Erinn breezes past the doorway without a goodbye. “Ready, Mom,” I hear her say.
“Tell your brother thank you for pickin’ you up.”
After Erinn complies, I hear the door close and Battle’s footsteps before he returns to the kitchen. He looks miserable and resentful—hurt. I want to get up and wrap my arms around him. I want to hug him and tell him that he can talk to me, but he grabs his keys, and says, “Let’s go,” before I have a chance.
“We don’t have to meet Ginger until four,” I remind him, noticing the clock on the wall—two forty-five.
“I need a drink first.”
He leaves. I hear a door open and close. While I gather his box of paperwork, his truck starts. I grab the stack of checks and cash and put them in my purse for safe keeping. With the file box in hand, I go out to his truck and place it behind my seat before climbing inside.
In the thirty seconds we were separated, his mood shifted from depressed to angry. He quickly backs out of the garage. The tires squeal when he peels out of the driveway. I’m walking on egg shells, afraid to say anything, but I can’t sit quietly and pretend not to notice his blatant ire. “Do you wanna talk about it?” I ask.
“No! I wanna drink until I forget.”
“Oh, because gettin’ drunk solves everything.”
His jaw ticks. “It helps.”
“For a little while, but …”
“Don’t, okay! Don’t pretend like you know anything about me!”
His deflecting his anger toward me is upsetting. I’m not his mother. “I know you’re pissed off your mother couldn’t be bothered to spend ten minutes discussin’ your sister when you clearly need to, because she’s too tired, which is bullshit, but don’t take it out on me.”
Cars honk as Battle quickly shifts lanes, pulling the truck over to the side of the road. He slams the truck in park and thrust his palms into the steering wheel, growling angrily. I’m slightly terrified and consider getting out and calling Ginger to come get me.
He turns in his seat to face me, his blue eyes ice cold. “Don’t fuckin’ talk about my mother!”
I swallow hard, knowing I had no right to say what I did about his mother. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything, but your anger is with her and you’re takin’ it out on me.”
He huffs out a breath. “I’m not angry at my mother.”
“Who then?”
“God … The universe. Whoever it is that’s takin’ her from me and Erinn. Whatever fuckin’ force out there decided it’s her time to go and is slowly killin’ her.”
“Battle … I’m sorry … I didn’t know.” How pathetic. I’ve never felt more ashamed.
His eyes well with unshed tears. He wipes them before they fall. “She has stage four breast cancer—terminal.” His head falls back and he looks up. “Why?” he screams until his skin glows red and the veins in his neck bulge.
I’m helpless to comfort him. I now have a faint understanding of why Battle and love aren’t on good terms. “How long does she have?”
“That’s the kicker,” he says with an indignant huff. “No one knows for sure. She underwent radiation and appeared to be in remission, giving her what we hoped would be a few more years, but the cancer came back with a vengeance. She started another round of radiation last week. That’s where she was today. And that’s why she’s too fuckin’ tired to discuss Erinn. Is it all right with you now if she’s tired?” I flinch when he slams his fist into the dash. “Or do you still think it’s all bullshit?”
“No, of course not.” I barely get the words out before I cover my mouth. Tears spill and race down my cheeks. “I’m sorry.”
He pulls back into traffic without another word. I want desperately to escape his truck, to go to the sanctity of my own space. What I said was insensitive, and I regret jumping to conclusions, but his reaction scares me. I don’t want to be around him when he’s emanating hostility.
He turns into McGee’s sports bar and finds a parking spot near the door. “Come inside and have a drink with me.” His unbearable blue eyes move between my lips and my eyes as he leans over the center console. My chest flutters. Butterflies dance in my stomach like Grammy said they would. I feel sick from the storm they’re creating in my gut. Of all the men to make me feel butterflies, why him? Why Battle? Why a man who is incapable of love with huge walls, who refuses to let me in? Grammy told me not to let him go, but he isn’t mine to hold onto. I bite my quivering lip. “I’m sorry for yellin’ at you. Don’t cry,” he says, his lips inching closer to mine.
