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“But Sophie was fired from Porteras.” I saw the pieces click together in Mom’s mind, in the completely wrong way. “Did you fire Sophie so you could date her?”
“No, we were a bit unprofessional, I’m afraid. We had something of a secret office romance for a few months, and then a situation arose in which I had no choice but to terminate her,” he said, taking another sip from his glass.
“He really did have to do it,” I assured her. “I was in the wrong, and it would have been impossible for me to continue working at Porteras after what I did.”
“Do I even want—” Mom stopped herself. “No, never mind. I don’t need to know.”
“It all worked out,” I reminded her. “Hello? Soon-to-be-published author? At twenty-five?”
“That reminds me, how did the interview go?” Mom’s mode shifted from interrogation to genuine caring and curiosity. I know a part of her excitement about my audition for Wake Up! America was the fun she would have going back to work and telling everyone about her daughter on TV.
“It went really well.” I was pretty sure it had. Everyone in the room had seemed enthusiastic about my ideas for possible segments, and my on-camera audition had been amazing. “I guess I look great on TV, so if it doesn’t work out, I could always be an anchor or something.”
“You do have a degree in journalism,” Mom said in her always-look-on-the-bright-side voice.
“So, Rebecca,” Neil began, reaching over to take my hand and squeeze it. He knew how nervous I still was about the audition, and the brief touch was welcome, as was his proposed change of subject. “Tell me about yourself. Sophie told me you work at the hospital?”
“I’m a monitor tech. I’ve been there since Sophie was knee high to a grasshopper,” she said with a fond smile at me. “Sophie is the first person in our family to go to college.”
“I must congratulate you on raising such a wonderful woman.” Neil sipped his whiskey. “And thank you, as well. It must not have been easy, doing it on your own.”
“Neil’s a single parent, too.” I was pleased to land on a subject where they had something in common.
“A single father who had nannies and only part-time custody,” he reminded me. “I know Sophie’s father wasn’t in the picture. It must have been very difficult.”
“It was. But it was worth it,” Mom said. “I kind of like this kid.”
Calling me a kid in front of Neil was going to bring up all sorts of pseudo-incest, creep-out issues he still wasn’t quite over. But he didn’t voice those now. “Sophie has told me about her father, and that he left. Has he ever tried to contact you or…”
“No. No, he saw her a few times, but I think the last time was her first birthday. He was a kid name a Joey Tangen, off the res down in Baraga. We met at a party and fooled around. That’s about all there is to that story.” Mom shrugged and took another sip of her Boone’s Farm.
“Have you seen him since?” Neil asked me.
I’d told him only the very basic facts about my missing dad: that he’d been sixteen when I was born, like my mom, that I had three photographs of him, and that my lifelong issues with abandonment probably stemmed back to Joey Tangen, absentee father.
I shrugged. “No. I don’t care to, either.”
“Wherever he is, he’s ancient history,” Mom agreed.
I hated talking about my bio-dad in front of Neil. There would always be some small, sad part of me that was truly embarrassed that my father had been able to walk away from me. So, when the subject switched again—Mom asked Neil about his job—I was relieved.
We sat around, drinking and talking. I never really got a sense of what Mom thought of Neil. I knew she wasn’t happy that I was dating him—if her little freak out at the house hadn’t clued me in, her super polite and interested faces during our conversation would have—but she didn’t seem like she was ready to poison him, so I guess I could thank god for small miracles.
I filled Mom in on what was happening in my best friend Holli’s life. Holli was currently dating Deja, assistant to Rudy Ainsworth, managing editor of Porteras and Neil’s best friend.
“She actually worked for Neil,” I said, deferring to him.
“Oh?” Mom loved Holli, and already I could see all the ways she was deciding that Deja wasn’t good enough for her. “What do you think of her? Is she a good girl? Is she going to treat Holli nice?”
“Uh, I believe so?” After three rocks glasses of Jack Daniels, his cute little drunk frown was starting to show up more often. “She was a good assistant. And very discreet, when she found out what was happening between Sophie and myself, which I appreciated very much.”
“She is just like a grown-up version of Holli. You’re going to love her,” I assured Mom.
“Holli is twenty-five years old,” Neil said with a chuckle. “I think Holli is the grown-up version of Holli, at this point.”
“Well, ladies and gents, I think it’s time for me to mosey off to bed.” Mom pulled the handle on the recliner to lower the footrest and got up, weaving just slightly. She stopped and pointed at both of us. “This is a trailer. The walls are thin. No hanky-panky.”
“Yes, well, I’ll try to restrain myself amid the romance of sleeping on a sofa bed in the living room of my girlfriend’s mother’s home,” Neil said dryly.
