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Remy gave my waist a squeeze and I knew what that meant so, out of sheer habit, I did what it meant.
I tipped my head back to look at him.
“What do you think? Dom?” he asked casually after what kind of champagne he should uncork.
Okay.
What the hell was going on here?
“Mom, don’t you have a kickoff tonight?” Manon put in.
“Oh shit, Mom, I didn’t remember. Shit, I’m so sorry,” Yves said.
“It’s okay, honey,” I replied to Yves. “You know you’re always more important than anything.”
Remy grunted.
I turned to look at him, my brows coming together.
“You disagree?” I asked.
“I didn’t say a word,” he answered.
“Not an intelligible one, but you very much spoke,” I retorted, and yes, there was some heat in it.
That was when he grinned at me.
I stared at him grinning, but I felt that grin somewhere very specific.
Okay!
WHAT THE HELL WAS GOING ON HERE?
“Is there something you two have to tell us?” Sabre asked, finally letting his parents’ position sink in.
“No.” I pulled forcefully out of Remy’s hold. “There absolutely is not. Now, are we having champagne or what?”
“I don’t actually need you guys to toast the fact that I’m gay,” Yves remarked.
“We aren’t toasting that. We’re toasting courage and truth, having the former and standing for the latter,” I informed him.
“You are so extra, Mom,” Yves teased.
“Excuse me,” I began. “But when you have children, and you watch them stick by each other as you three did today, navigating what should have been certain, but what society and media and every coming-out movie, and let us please be done with them and just have gays being gays or whatever, the LBGTQ experience has many faceted and nuanced experiences than just the coming out bit, as David Rose on Schitt’s Creek so brilliantly portrayed.” I realized I was digressing into sermonizing and pulled it together. “But you felt like they were uncertain waters, so you navigated them close to each other’s sides, then you can talk to me about extra.”
Manon leaned toward her younger brother and stage-whispered, “And again with more extra.”
I looked to the ceiling and huffed out a breath.
“Go to your kickoff, Mom,” Yves urged. “We’ll have a celebration about courage and truth when Noel has the chance to have it catered.”
“Catered,” Sabre said. “How did they not know you were gay?”
“Dude,” Yves shot back. “It’s you who loses it over Lucie’s crab cakes. I’m doing you a solid.”
“He just loses it over Lucie,” Manon decreed.
“She’s too old for him,” Yves said.
“Who says a man has to date a younger woman?” Manon asked.
“Right, who says?” Sabre put in.
Please, God, let that be about Lucie, who did make amazing crab cakes, and not about Myrna, who was far too old for my son.
Though, Lucie, at a guess, was in her mid-to-late-twenties so she was not.
Hmm.
“You talk to Noel, I’ll provide the booze. Family celebration at the old house,” Remy decreed. “Sunday, after league.” He looked down at me. “Six o’clock.”
By the by, “the old house” referred to my house.
I…
Uh.
What?
Absolutely not!
“Works for me.” Yves.
“Me too, I don’t have a class Monday until the afternoon. I can leave Monday morning and make it, no sweat.” Manon.
“If it’s crab cakes, I’ll get up early to drive down Monday and make class. So I’m in too.” Sabre.
Remy smiled at me.
I narrowed my eyes on it in order not to land my fist in it.
Then I shook it off and took the short trek to the armchair to retrieve my clutch.
Once I’d done that, I turned to my children and demanded, “Hugs.”
They came to me one by one, and I took my time over them, especially with Yves.
“Love you forever and ever,” I whispered in his ear.
“Love you too, Mom,” he grunted in mine.
We broke apart, I cupped his face a second, he shook his head and smirked at me—so like his father’s—then I dropped my hand, turned to his dad and dipped my chin.
“Remy,” I said as farewell, intent to exit tout de suite.
“I’ll walk you to your car.”
For fuck’s sake.
Since our divorce, the man had not once walked me to my car.
In order not to make a deal of it, I nodded, smiled at each of my kids in turn, then preceded Remy through his house, out his door, down his walk and to my car.
I’d rounded the hood and was in the process of opening the door when it shut because Remy’s hand was on it.
I turned to him.
“What are you—?”
“Why were you crying earlier, Wyn?”
Ugh.
We were back here.
“I have kickoff to get to,” I reminded him. “And as usual, I’m late.”
“Won’t ask again,” he warned.
“Remy,” I snapped.
“Answer me this, are you okay?”
No, I was not.
Because not an hour ago, I’d let him go.
Now, he was being strange and maneuvering a family celebration at my house that he was attending.
