Just call me
“Sybil.”
Mark’s hard gaze eventually settled on Kathy. She would be victim number one. “Young Lady,” he began as I saw her wince, “you’ve got a hell of a lot of explaining to do.” He inclined his head toward Nate. “Did he stay here all night? In your room?”
Kathy wrung her hands, clearly tongue-tied.
“
Well?
” Mark shouted. “Did he stay in your room?”
“Yes,” Nate replied, followed quickly by, “sir. But nothing happened. We just wanted to hold each other.”
Oh, Nathaniel. You’re lying through your teeth. You always tug on your right ear when you fib.
I saw the mushroom clouds in Mark’s eyes and tried to reduce the number of ensuing casualties. “Nate, you need to go home. We’ll talk about this when I get back.”
Mark’s fatherly indignation was redirected at me. “That’s all you’re going to say to him? Your son took advantage of my little girl.”
“I’m not your little girl anymore,” Kathy shouted, finally finding her voice—her very loud voice. Stomping her foot like a child detracted from the overall message. She stopped wringing her hands and stepped closer to Nate, threading her arm through his and interlacing their fingers. The intimate, loving gesture made my heart ache for them. “I’m Nate’s girlfriend.”
I’d never seen Mark so angry, and, despite how much I loved my son, I understood Mark’s reaction. I also figured I needed to get Nate out of there.
Fast
. “Nate, go home. Now.” This situation needed someone to diffuse the potential for a nasty, ugly argument.
Nate stared at the crutches for a moment and then at me, but I shook my head in response to his unasked question. There was enough to deal with at the moment. I could explain the stupid sprain to him later. He gave me a quick nod and pulled away from Kathy before he shoved his feet into his shoes, grabbed his jacket off the coat rack, and left through the garage.
“Mark, I think I should go too.” Then I stupidly realized my chance for a ride had just walked out the door. If I wanted to go home, Mark would have to drive me.
“You need to stay here for a day or two,” he said in the same scolding voice he’d used with his daughter.
I bit back a sarcastic retort.
Carly, who’d been watching the whole episode with wide-eyed astonishment, came to stand next to me and adopted a motherly tone. “You can’t go home, Ms. Delgado. You need someone to take care of you.” She picked up my crutches and moved them out of my reach. “Dad, why don’t you carry her into the family room? I’ll get some ice for her ankle.”
“I should really go home,” I insisted. “Carly, do you think you can catch Nate for me?” She didn’t budge.
“I told you, Jackie,” Mark scolded, “you should stay here, at least for tonight. You can’t get up your stairs. Hell, you can’t even walk.”
Kathy’s face quickly flushed crimson as she wagged her index finger at her father. “Oh! So it’s fine if
your
girlfriend spends the night, but if
my
boyfriend stays—”
His interruption was swift and loud. “It’s not the same thing!”
“Bullshit,” sweet, little Kat replied.
“She’s hurt,” Mark said through clenched teeth.
“She wasn’t hurt when you two went to the cabin. Did you sleep on the couch there, Daddy, or in the spare bedroom? Did you?” Mark glared at her. “I didn’t think so.”
Score one for Kathy.
This was going to get worse before it got better. Carly was staring at her feet, and I wasn’t sure it was my place to step into the mix now that Nate was gone.
Boy, oh boy, was he ever going to get it when I saw him again.
Then I realized I was being a hypocrite. Nate was an adult, albeit a young adult, but an adult nonetheless. What he and Kat were doing wasn’t really any different than what Mark and I were doing. He obviously didn’t feel the same way. I guess being a parent of a son is different from being the parent of a daughter. Shit, David would probably be patting the kid on the back.
Kathy and Mark had stopped shouting at each other and were now trying to set a record for time spent in an angry stare down. He finally uttered a curse and strode over to me. He scooped me into his arms before I could protest and marched me into the living room. I heard footsteps stomping down the hall followed by the slam of a bedroom door and assumed she’d removed herself from our company.
Setting me down on the sofa, he returned to the kitchen. I could hear him rummaging around, slamming cabinets and digging through things until he returned with a big plastic bag full of ice. I tried not to wince when he propped my foot on the coffee table and put the compress on my ankle a little bit more forcefully than necessary. I wasn’t about to scold him as he went back to the kitchen.
Mark said something to Carly before she came to sit on the end of the sofa. I leaned forward to shift the ice to the worst of the swelling.
“Ms. Delgado?”
“Hmm?” I looked around for a pillow, but the only one I could find was on the far chair.
“Do you think Nate and Kathy had sex?”
Holy shit.
She actually asked me that.
Aloud.
“Well, Carly...I don’t know. But if they did, I’m sure it’s not anyone’s business except theirs.”
“The hell it’s not!” Mark came into the room, carrying a glass of orange juice and two ibuprofens. He handed them off to me. I was touched that—despite the high drama surrounding our arrival—he remembered I needed something for the pain. “Here, take these. I’m going to make some coffee.”
“Thank you.”
He just grunted a response and went back to the kitchen.
“I think they had sex,” Carly stated as casually as if we had been discussing the chance of precipitation. She fixed those big, brown eyes on me. “You and Dad are having sex too, right?”
I choked on my orange juice, barely able to keep from spewing it across the room.
Now what?
A legal scale suddenly appeared in my thoughts as I weighed my options. I could lie to her. But Carly was perceptive enough to see right through it. The girl was fourteen going on forty. If I told her a lie, not only would she know it, but I’d also look like an absolute moron and a bald-faced liar. She’d never trust me again.
I could tell her the truth. But it really wasn’t something I thought I should be discussing with a fourteen-year-old.
Damn it all anyway.
“Well, um...Carly. Your father and I are—”
“In love,” she said with a quick nod.
“And people who are in love—”
“Want to show each other how much they care,” she said, finishing my thought. “Mom told me sex is wonderful, but it’s better to wait until you’re married. She said sometimes people don’t wait, but that doesn’t make them bad.”
Mark took a couple of steps into the room and evidently heard the conversation because he quickly turned on his heel and retreated back to the kitchen.
Coward.
“Kathy and Nate probably didn’t want to wait. Mom said when you have sex too soon in a relationship that it can kill it. You should love each other first.” Carly slid a hair band off her wrist, pulled her hair into a ponytail, and tied it. “Having sex becomes more important than learning to love. I think Mom was right.”
“I think she was right too,” I replied.
“Dad loved Mom so much, I didn’t think he’d ever fall in love again.”
The girl was the epitome of honesty.
She twisted her ponytail around her finger. “But I think he’s in love with you.”
I shifted uncomfortably, trying to move the ice that was now hurting more than helping. I always hated icing an injury almost as much as the injury itself, but I had to admit I was more uncomfortable having this type of conversation with Carly.
Elaine had obviously had “the talk” with her daughter, and I wasn’t sure Carly needed a surrogate mother—especially one who was now sleeping with her father.
“And you love him.” Her words were a statement, not a question. “I think he loved you right from the start. I could see it. You, too. You loved him too.” The kid was insightful beyond her years. “I suppose it’s okay if you two spend the night together.” She leveled her gaze at me, with her eyes serious and her mouth drawn thin. “Just don’t let it mess you two up. Okay, Ms. Delgado?”
“I really think it’s all right if you call me Jackie now.”
A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. “I promise not to at school.”
Mark must have decided it was safe to come back into the room. He’d probably been listening for a break in the intense conversation. He carried two mugs of what I fervently hoped was strong coffee. “Cream and sweetener.” He handed me a cup bearing Garfield’s image.
“Thank you.” He settled on the arm of the sofa, sipping his coffee. “Your daughter and I were having a nice little chat.”
“Girl talk.” Carly got up and headed back to the kitchen.
“Girl talk, huh?” Mark asked after she had left. “I think she misses her mom.”
“I think so too. Elaine did a great job raising those girls.”
He snorted. “Looks like she didn’t get everything important across to Kat.”
I sipped the coffee, trying to think of what would be the most appropriate thing to say. Then I found some courage. “Mark, they’re not babies. I know you don’t approve. I don’t, either—but Nate turned nineteen last week. I assume Kathy’s the same age.”
“Just turned nineteen too. She’s a baby.”
“She’ll always be your little girl, but she’s a young woman with her own life now. It’s hard to let them go. I know.”
“Your kids won’t turn up pregnant with the guy running out the door the minute he finds out.”
I took major offense to the inference that my Nate would knock up Kathy and leave her high and dry. “My boys would never do that to a girl.”
“See? Even you called her a
girl.
”
I had to think about that for a second. I guess our kids will always be our kids. “Point taken. Look, I don’t think they should be...you know...getting physical. But at some point they’ve got to make those choices for themselves. I think my boys learned something from my mistakes, and I hope to hell they don’t follow in my footsteps.”
He sipped his coffee, obviously contemplating my words. “I don’t like it,” he finally grumbled.
“I don’t, either.”
“How’s the ankle?”
“Nice way to change the subject. The ankle’s sore. Do you think you could take me home? Nate will be there, so I won’t be on my own. I think you need some alone time with Kathy and Carly.”
“Jackie, you can’t even walk.”
“Nate can help me. Please, Mark. Please. You need to spend time with your daughters, and I really need to sit Nate down and try to talk some sense into him.” I handed him my now empty coffee cup. “I’m exhausted, I hurt like hell, and I want to catch a long nap.”
He nodded. “I’ll get your crutches.”
***
Patrick’s car was parked next to Nate’s in my driveway.
“Shit,” I mumbled under my breath.
Mark was still a sore point with my oldest, and I really didn’t think any of us needed another confrontation today.
“What’s wrong?” Mark asked as he turned off the Honda.
“Both my boys are here.”
“That’s good. They can help you if you need anything.” He crawled out of the car and came around to my side. “Can you stand up?”
I nodded and awkwardly got to my feet. Instead of reaching in the back seat to get my crutches, he immediately scooped me into his. He kicked on the door leading into the house until it suddenly opened to reveal Patrick. I watched my son’s eyes flash with barely contained fury.
“What in the hell happened?”
This day just kept on giving. “I sprained my ankle. Think you can move so Mark can put me down?”
Patrick moved aside.
Mark carried me into the living room and deposited me on the couch. He grabbed a pillow, put it on the coffee table, and propped my foot up. “Want some ice?”
“No, but I need it anyway.” I glanced up to find my oldest staring holes through me.
Patrick jerked his thumb at Mark. “What did he do to you?”
“I sprained my ankle, Patrick. Mark didn’t do anything to me.” I had a flash to how Kat must have felt when she was getting the inquisition from Mark. Why was I defending my life to my child? “I was hiking and I tripped over a tree root.”
Patrick shot a glare at Mark when he returned with a bag of ice that he set on my ankle. “You had no business going away with this...this...
guy
.”
“I don’t see how that’s any of your business, son,” Mark said in a stern voice that told me he’d reached his limit.
Patrick’s scowl could melt metal. “She’s my mother and—.”
“I’m old enough to know my own mind,” I interrupted. “We’ll talk about it later, Patrick. Mark?”
“Hmm?”
“Thanks for everything. Why don’t you go home and get some rest? It was an awfully long night.” My face instantly flushed, realizing how dirty what I’d just said probably sounded to my son. “We didn’t get much sleep.”
Oh, yeah, that made things better
. “My ankle throbbed all night. Mark was getting me ice and—”
“I’ll bet,” Patrick snidely replied. “I’ll bet that’s
all
he did. Get you ice.”
Watching Mark set his stubborn jaw, I figured the best thing to do was diffuse the time bomb by getting him to leave. But I really didn’t want him to go. I wanted his arms around me. I wanted him to get me my ibuprofen and ice when I needed it. I wanted him to make me forget the pain with a kiss or two.
I had been a horrible coward for most of my adult life—always taking the path of least resistance instead of pushing for what I wanted, what I needed. Whenever David and I made plans, we always ended up doing exactly what he wanted to do. I guess after years of never getting what I wanted and never winning a single battle, I’d lapsed into a state of learned helplessness. I simply gave in.
Well, I wasn’t going to give in now. If I wanted Mark around, then, damn it, Mark was going to be around.
“Patrick, sit down. We need to talk.”