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It still kind of felt weird to see him holding a mug, some part of me always seeing him as the little boy he had once been, not the man he had become.
It was especially weird because he’d been away at college for the past few years. Sure, we saw him on holidays and breaks, but it seemed like the time between just chiseled more and more of his boyhood away, leaving a grown man there instead.
Tall, fit, strong jaw, and a somewhat stern brow.
Still, it was strange to know your first baby was drinking coffee and old enough to buy his own liquor.
He couldn’t rent a car yet, so there was that.
You were not completely an adult until you could rent a car.
That was not rational, but I was clinging to it, regardless.
Hazel was heading to college in the fall as well, and my heart was aching at the idea of having another of my kids away from home.
She was out in the backyard with her siblings, all of them hanging out on the trampoline, just talking. She’d been clinging to them this year, sensing the strain of separation coming soon. All the things she knew she would miss.
She grew up stupidly pretty.
Tall like me. Thin, from the ballet, but strong from all the martial arts. Long, mahogany hair. And one of those faces that was just effortlessly pretty. Prettier even, in my humble opinion, without makeup than with it.
I was nervous about her leaving.
Something I knew traced back toward my own trauma and concerns of her being out there in the world, away from her dad, uncles, cousins, and the safety that they provided.
But I knew I had to fight those feelings. I had to trust that I raised a girl who knew her worth, who would trust her instincts about men.
So far, her boyfriends had all been amazing guys. And she’d always been the one to end things as kindly as she could, declaring to me in private that she just… knew they weren’t right. And that she was waiting for her own happily ever after like I had with Seth.
I was beyond overjoyed that we could give her an example of what a good, healthy relationship should look like. So that she would never settle for less than that.
“I know I don’t have to,” Isaac said, brows pinching as he looked at me.
“I’m not discouraging you, baby,” I told him. “I just don’t want you to make the decision based on some feeling of obligation or something like that.”
“It’s not obligation,” Isaac insisted. “I want to join the club. Because of what they represent. Because of everything they brought to all our lives. Because, one day, I want to give that kind of family to my kids. That’s why I want to prospect.”
Maybe I should have had more reservations.
I was a mom.
I had to worry about his safety.
The club couldn’t guarantee that.
But I’d been around for a long time now. I’d seen all of the ups and downs of the club. And, sure, there had been times of nail-biting suspense and stomach-clenching uncertainty.
Always, though, things worked out in our favor.
I had no reason to assume that wasn’t a pattern that would continue.
“Well then,” I said, giving him a big smile. “I’m really glad I taught you how to clean, because that is all you are going to be doing for the next several months,” I told him, getting a smile so much like mine out of him.
“Alright, is it done?” Seth asked, peeking around the corner into the kitchen.
“Hey!” I said, mouth falling open a bit. “You talked to your father about it first? I feel like I should be so insulted.”
“I had to ask Dad if it was even an option,” Isaac said, shrugging.
“Club stuff,” Seth said, coming up by me, stealing my coffee, and taking a sip. “Once we talked about the club stuff, it was time to talk about doing it.”
“Oh, fine, then,” I said, exhaling hard. “But as a mother, I demand that you do not listen to your Uncle Sully about the fun he had in his young club days,” I demanded.
“The Slip-N-Slide,” Isaac said with a smirk.
“Ugh. You should not know about the whipped cream Slip-N-Slide,” I declared.
“Don’t forget the chocolate syrup,” Seth said.
“And the licking,” Isaac added.
“Grosssss. I have failed as a mother,” I said, wincing.
To that, Isaac got up, coming over, and pressing a kiss to my cheek. “You are the best mother ever,” he told me, with so much sincerity that I felt tears sting at my eyes. “Now I’m going to go make up a bunch of horror stories and shit about the dorms to tell Hazel.”
Seth chuckled at that, then put down the mug, and pulled me close.
“He is right, you know.”
“About what?”
“You being the best mother ever,” he told me.
