It’s a sign of how bad I’m feeling that I don’t refuse, even knowing that’s the one she likes best too. But like the good friend that she is, she picks up a Milky Way and starts munching that instead.
“Spill. What’s happened now?” she asks, licking chocolate off her fingers.
“Hotwiring a car. Driving it away. Rolling it into a ditch.” I list my son’s misdemeanours. “The police are involved.”
“Fuck.” Her eyes widen. “Is he going to have to do time?”
I blow out a breath, the strand of hair that’s fallen over my face lifting with it. “I’m hoping for probation, but it’s only a matter of when, not if, before he goes down.” This isn’t the first time he’s gotten into trouble, and I know it won’t be the last.
“Being caught might knock some sense into him,” she contradicts. “Having to face up to what he’s done might do him some good.”
But I know my son. “He’ll meet others inside, even in juvie. He’ll either be hurt or will get into a gang for when he comes out.” As she goes to speak again, I wave her down. “I’ve got a lawyer, fuck knows I can’t afford it, but I wasn’t going to leave it to the public defender. She intimated if he’s not put away, they might look at his home situation and put him into a foster home if they think I’m an inadequate mother.”
“Oh, Vanna.” Her hand reaches over and covers mine. “You’ve done everything you can for that boy. You’ve lived for him, given your soul for him. You’re the best mom in the world. A lot of moms don’t do half of what you’ve done. You’ve been to every football game he’s played in, stood on the sidelines in freezing snow. You’ve been there for him, helping him with school.”
“It hasn’t worked though, has it, Lindy? I could never make up for his father not being around.”
“Hang on. Let me get that coffee.” She gets up, walks off, and returns shortly after, carrying two cups and puts them down. Mine is white with two sugars, just as I like it.
She blows on hers to cool it, takes a sip too soon and winces, then places it on the table. “Lots of kids are brought up with only one parent, Vanna.”
“And they do alright,” I finish for her. “Perhaps it’s me. I’ve tried my best, but as it turns out, that’s not good enough. Nothing I’ve done has worked.”
“Where is he now? School?”
My head moves up then down. “Yes. I’m picking him up. He’s not allowed to go anywhere else. I want him under my eye.”
“So that’s why you’re not drinking?”
“First, I’m driving, so yeah. And second…”
She grimaces, understanding what I’ve not yet said. “You’re giving no one any more ammunition.”
Exactly. I place my own coffee on the table and lean my head back against the sofa. Castiel, Cas as he’s known, is my fourteen-year-old wayward son. He gets into trouble more than he’s out of it. Maybe it’s because I don’t have a man who can help me keep him in line, or maybe I should just acknowledge the truth of it. When things went bad, they affected my son.
“He still has nightmares, Lindy.”
“Still?” Her eyebrows arch. “The same ones?”
“About his father leaving and denying him?” My lips press together. “I don’t know, but he shouts out at night.”
“It’s been ten years, Vanna. Surely he can’t remember what happened that long ago? He was only four.”
“I don’t know,” I admit. “Maybe it’s down to me not handling it properly. I’ve tried to explain to him, but he’s never been able to understand. Maybe if I’d told him his father was dead, it would be easier for him to accept.”
“It’s not down to you, Vanna. You always expected him to come back, it’s just that he never did. You never wanted to close the door and kept it open.”
She’s right. I did. I never stopped hoping. “What am I to do?” Sitting forward, I put my head in my hands, rubbing my eyes then drawing my fingers down my cheeks. “Cas is going through his teenage angst, and all this just adds to it. I can’t remember him ever being a happy little boy, despite everything I tried to do. I don’t know what’s going to happen to him, but something has to change. We can’t go on like this. Lindy, I’m scared I’m going to lose him.” To jail, to a gang, or to a foster home. “What am I to do?” I repeat.
“Get married again.”
I hold up my hand with my wedding band still on my third finger of my left hand. “I still am.”
But that doesn’t put a dent in her stride. “Divorce his ass and take him to the cleaners while you’re at it. You’ve never asked for a penny, have you?”
I haven’t. That’s down partly to pride, but also for the sake of the man I promised to love forever. It’s meant I’ve been a working mom and Cas a latch-key kid when he was old enough to be left on his own.
“I don’t want another man,” I tell her, my mouth quirking slightly. “I can’t get involved with someone just so he’d be a good influence on my son.”
“You can’t go through life moping after a man who doesn’t want you, Vanna.” Lindy picks up her coffee and starts drinking now that it’s cooled. “What are you going to do when Cas is grown and moved away? He’s going to one day, you know?”
“For now, he needs me. He’s only got one parent. I’ve got to be there for him. How would I have time to go on dates anyway, and I’d need to, to meet a man? It’s not like I can pop one into my basket at Walmart.” After all this time, I might entertain the idea if it was that easy. I’ve been on my own for far too long. Sex I can probably take or leave as long as I have my trusty vibrator and a few inspirational books on the side, but it’s the comfort of someone else being there, someone to share all the joys and tribulations that I feel I’m missing out on. But Cas would see that as another betrayal, and he’s had far too much of that already in his short life. He needs me, whether or not he wants to. I know him too well. He’d be suspicious if I brought home a man, and would probably rebel even more.
Lindy’s staring into her cup as if trying to find the answer there. “Why don’t you let his father have him for a while?”
“You know why not. That’s an impossible idea.”
“Is it? How long since you’ve seen him? Since you’ve spoken with him? Maybe everything’s changed now.”
Maybe it has. But it wouldn’t be for the better. If it were, he’d already be here. I frown. “If it’s changed, then why hasn’t he been in touch? No, he’s moved on as he said he would. He wants nothing to do with me or our son.”
Perhaps I should divorce his ass as Lindy had suggested. After all these years, desertion would be easy to prove.
I glance up at her clock on the wall, drain my coffee and stand. “I better run now if I’m going to catch Cas when he comes out of school.”
“If you’re not by the door, he’ll take off.” She knows me, and him, only too well. “Look, why don’t you bring him over at the weekend. We’ll do something, I don’t know, the zoo?”