“Uh . . .” I tossed my thumb over my shoulder, but then dropped it, my heart a jackhammer as my thoughts swirled. No, no, no. You weren’t supposed to be here! The man at the door as I’d entered the bar earlier in the evening told me Isaac wasn’t here and wasn’t due back for several weeks. I was going to be sick.
His shocked stare moved over my shoulder and then back to me, the sharpness of suspicion there tempered by the persistence of his disbelief and—unless I was mistaken?—a hint of concern. “Are you hurt? Did someone hurt you?”
I shook my head. “No. Not at all.”
Confusion replaced disbelief. “Are you drunk?”
I shook my head again.
A severe glare took up residence on his features and he stepped closer, lowering his voice and making no attempt to veil his anger. “Then what the fuck are you doing here?”
Gasping at his language, the unsavory word a bucket of ice water to my senses, my motherly instincts kicked in. “Isaac Gregory Sylvester! Good heavens. Watch your words.”
He clamped his mouth shut, his jaw working as his glare shifted over my shoulder once more. “Which room?”
“Pardon?”
“Which room did you just leave?”
I stiffened my back. “That’s none of your affair,” I said, even though what I wanted to say was, I love you, I miss you. Won’t you come visit me?
If my brain was in chaos, my heart was an anarchist. I hadn’t seen my son in ages. He hadn’t acknowledged any of us—any of his family—since before he’d returned from deployment overseas and joined the Wraiths. I’d cried in the shower about it, about him, about the loss of my sweet boy, for years—every Tuesday and Thursday, as a matter of fact.
Isaac’s blue eyes, so familiar to me and yet not, sliced to mine, pinning me in place. I held my breath. What did he see, I wondered? Did he have any fond memories of his childhood? Did he remember the day we played hooky and I took him to the pumpkin patch an hour north and we’d raced through the corn maze, laughing our butts off? Did he remember—
“Come on.” My tall son wrapped a hand around my upper arm and pulled me down the hall, his jaw continuing to flex like he was grinding his teeth.
I swallowed the urge to ask if he was wearing his mouth guard at night. The dentist had been quite adamant about it after he’d had his braces off. Our son was a night-grinder and he’d wear his teeth down if he wasn’t diligent. And who was checking on him? Who was making sure he wore his mouth guard and had his clothes washed in hypoallergenic detergent? Did he have his tea tree oil? His skin had always been so sensitive.
Biting my lip to stifle a sob that tasted like despair, I blinked away silent tears. I couldn’t stop them. He was leading me out, I understood that, but I didn’t want to leave now. I wanted to sit and talk to him. Just for a minute. My heart ached so badly, my vision actually turned grey for a moment, blackness creeping at the edges.
My head swimming, I tried dragging me feet. “Could we—could we just talk for a—”
“No. You need to leave. Now.” His voice was so hard, whipping out like a lash.
I closed my eyes and let myself be led, wishing we were anywhere else. But then I opened my eyes again because—as painful as this moment felt—here he was. We were together. He might never want to see me, he might never want to know me, but that just meant this was a rare opportunity. I needed to pull myself together. I needed to make the most of it.
“Are they treating you well?” I asked as he turned another corner.
Silence.
“Your hair is so short,” I lamented, missing his blond baby locks, and his longer hair when he’d been a teen. I’d given him his first haircut on his first birthday. I still had the little baggie of hair. I’d intended to make him a baby book, but it was just too painful to contemplate these days. So, I kept it in my office at the Lodge. Sometimes I took it out on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
He paused at a corner, pushing me behind him as he peered around it. Seemingly satisfied, he shifted his hand from my arm to my back and pressed me forward. “No one is up yet,” he whispered. “If we’re quiet and fast, we should be able to get you out without any trouble.”
“I—I parked my car—”
“I know. I saw it in the lot.”
All too soon, we were in the bar area, and then out the double doors, and then in the parking lot making a straight line for my BMW. He turned to me as we approached, his eyes conducting a hasty survey of my features.
“Are you sure you’re not drunk? Can you drive?”
I swiped at my face and sniffled. “Really, Isaac. I only had one drink and that was hours ago. I am perfectly fit to drive.”
He stepped back, taking his hand with him, and crossed his arms. “Then you need to go. Right now.”
Fiddling with my keys, I hesitated, not wanting to unlock the door. “You could come with me. We could . . . talk?” Goodness. I hated how I sounded, this raw vulnerability, hope scratching at my throat. But what could I do? This was my son! I loved him. I missed him.
His stare a stone wall, he snatched the keys from my grip. He unlocked the door. He opened the door. He put me inside the car. He tossed the keys to my lap. He shut the door. He walked away.
And he didn’t turn back.
I felt like death. Death and what moldy bread looks like.
“Ugh.”
“Momma.”
“Jennifer?” I croaked, blinking but finding the dim room entirely too bright. Each minuscule ray of light felt like a shard of glass piercing my eyes. Laying back before I got a chance to sit up, I groaned. “Goodness, my head.”
A cool cloth pressed against my forehead. It felt divine. “How are you feeling?”
“Like death. And what moldy bread looks like.” I knew I reclined in my bed, and Jennifer sat close by, and . . . what happened?
“How much did you drink?”
“Drink? What time is it?”
“It’s four in the afternoon Christmas day.” A pause, then, “You don’t remember?”
“Remember? Remember wh—” Cheese and crackers! “Oh no!” I clutched my stomach as the memories flooded my brain.
I’d driven home after being dismissed by Isaac, crying the whole way. Today was Christmas and I was supposed to be spending it alone. In a moment of insanity, I’d consumed brandy this morning. So much brandy. And then everything was very fuzzy. But my stomach felt like I’d done one thousand crunches on an incline.
“When did—what are you doing here?” I licked my lips and that’s when I tasted my mouth. New memories arrived. I’d vomited. A lot. And my daughter had held my hair back.
My. Daughter.
Have you no shame, Diane? The sharp voice in my head sounded a lot like my ex-husband’s. Maybe because he’d asked that question of me many, many times.
Attempting to breathe through my nose, I winced. “I smell like Belle Cooper’s Christmas trifle.”
Trifle was a dessert, and how Baptists justified consuming large quantities of brandy (or whiskey, or rye, or bourbon, whatever your pleasure) during the holidays. Belle called it “flavoring.” But four cups of liquor in one desert containing six servings isn’t flavoring any more than her two-fisted bottom-gropings of young men were hugs.