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“You make me happy.” I smile.
“Which is why when it’s all said and done she will accept this.” He gestures between the two of us.
“I hope you’re right.” I push off his lap, standing.
“I’m always right, or haven’t you figured that out by now?” He smirks.
“You’re so full of yourself.” I chuckle, sneaking down the hall to peek in on Jack, who is sitting in the middle of his bedroom driving cars on his racetrack area rug.
I smile and watch him for a long moment before quietly pulling his door closed and heading back out into the living room.
“What did you mean earlier when you said you understood why I didn’t want to give him that satisfaction?” His question seemingly comes out of nowhere and it takes a minute to process what he’s asking.
“I just meant I get it.” I shrug, picking up the puzzle pieces off the coffee table that Jack was working on this morning.
“No, you said it like you knew from experience. What’s that about?”
“Nothing.” I blow it off, turning to drop some of the pieces into the puzzle box.
“You never talk about your parents,” he observes. “I know your dad left when you were little. That’s it. You never talk about your mom. I know you moved here to get away from her, to get Jack away from her. I just don’t know why.”
“Let’s just say my mother is not a very nice person, and as far as I’m concerned I no longer have a mother.”
“Did she hurt you?”
“I don’t want to talk about this, Ant,” I say, dropping the box on the table and making my way into the kitchen to get a water.
“Why won’t you tell me?” Ant appears in the doorway, clearly not ready to let this go just yet. “I’m sorry to push. I just, I want to know every part of you.”
“My mother is not in my life, nor will she ever be again. She will never meet her grandson or play the role of doting grandparent. She’s not a part of me,” I snip, pulling a bottle of water from the refrigerator and taking a long drink before turning to face him.
“But she is a part of who you were, and that means something to me.”
“Ant.”
“It’s bad, isn’t it?”
“Let’s just say my mother makes your father look like a saint,” I say, brushing past him on my way out of the kitchen.
“Hey.” He catches my arm, halting my steps. “You can tell me anything. You know that, right?” he asks, turning me toward him.
“I know,” I say weakly, finally meeting his gaze.
I want to tell him the truth—that my mom was a drunk who shared me with her boyfriends, whether intentionally or not. I want to tell him about the years of neglect and abuse. How when I was seven one of her drinking buddies, Mark, fingered me for the first time while she was out on a beer run. How he was the first of three different guys, and that each time it got worse until I was not only having sex with one of her boyfriends but enjoying it.
How do you tell someone something like that? How do you just bare your soul and not expect for them to look at you differently?
“I just don’t want to talk about it is all.” I sigh, allowing him to pull me into his arms.
“Okay.” He kisses the top of my head. “I’m sorry for prying.”
“It’s okay,” I speak into his chest.
“What do you say we avoid heavy topics for the rest of the night, and I take you and Jack out for pizza and ice cream?” he offers, smiling down at me when I pull back to look up at him.
“I’d say you know the way to my heart, Mr. Treadway.” I grin, pushing past the heaviness that has settled in my chest just thinking about my mother.
“Why don’t you go grab Jack, and I’ll go pull the truck around to the front?”
“Sounds good.” I push up on my tiptoes and kiss his jaw before taking off in the direction of Jackson’s room, grateful to have avoided having a conversation I have no desire to have right now.
There’s too much going on already. Between me and Ant and whatever it is we’re doing here—to Courtney, to his dad and the clear rift in his family—everything is so up in the air right now. So many things are uncertain. I don’t want to give him a reason to be uncertain about me, and I feel like that’s exactly what having that conversation would do.
I can’t share that part of myself with him, not yet. I’m just not ready. Honestly, I’m not sure I’ll ever be ready.
