But he just sniffs, shrugs, and says, “Not for a long time. I did bring wine for you, though,” he adds, holding up a brown paper bag I hadn’t realized he’d had with him. He tries to smile at me. “Malbec, if I remember right?”
Holy shit.
He remembers the wine I drink?
I offer what little smile I can manage. “Thank you. That’s sweet.”
“Well, don’t thank me yet, because along with the gift comes a doctor’s warning that you shouldn’t drink any of it until you’re off your pain meds.”
I chuckle. “Everything lovely comes with a caveat nowadays. That’s okay, I’m already being scolded by my son for cleaning, so I can just add this to the list.”
That makes Greg frown. “You shouldn’t be cleaning. At least, nothing too intense. No vacuuming or sweeping or mopping. Definitely no mowing. Don’t lift anything over ten pounds for a while.” His frown deepens as he looks around, as if he’s just realized a house will go to shambles when the only person living in it can’t do those things. “Didn’t Dr. Simmons go over all this with you?”
David gives a hearty laugh, grabbing the bag-wrapped bottle out of Greg’s hand then. “Ha! That’s funny. You think my mom would listen to anything a damn doctor tells her to do?”
He gives me a pointed look, and then disappears into the kitchen with the wine bottle.
When I look at Greg again, he’s still frowning.
“You can’t do those things,” he reiterates. “You don’t want to end up back in the hospital.”
I fight the urge to say that I might, if it means I can see him in those scrubs again.
Although, the way he’s dressed now is possibly even more distracting, his light jeans hanging off his hips the same way those scrub bottoms did. His t-shirt is navy blue and tight in all the right places, too, reminding me that his biceps are roughly the size of my head now. I try not to let my eyes trail down too far before I meet his gaze again.
“I’m not doing anything I don’t think I can handle,” I tell him. “But someone’s got to clean around here. Not to mention the hot water heater, which—”
“Which your amazing, handsome, doting, handyman son is taking care of,” David says with a pointed look, handing me a glass of water and two pills I’m due to take as he rejoins us.
I roll my eyes. “I can do it myself, David. You have a baby at home. A baby who hasn’t been over to see his grandma in far too long, might I add.”
The second the word leaves my lips, I cringe, eyes skirting to Greg before I clear my throat and gesture to one of the chairs in the living room for him to sit.
Grandma.
Yeah, let’s just stick that image in his mind.
Then again, it wouldn’t be a bad thing, to remind him how much older I am — especially with the way he’s looking at me now, his brown eyes heating as they travel the length of my dress.
My dress that does nothing to hide how expansive my curves are nowadays.
I learned real quick that once I hit thirty-five, my already slow metabolism all but died. Josh could eat a whole cake and not gain a pound, but if I so much as looked at a slice of it, I went up a jeans size.
I never minded it. I’ve always loved my curves, especially my ass — which is roughly the size of an overgrown pumpkin. It was Josh who had the issue, who always liked to point out that I should go to the gym more, or pick up a more active hobby, or eat less ice cream.
Fucker.
I eat ice cream almost every night now that he’s gone.
And from the way Greg’s heated stare keeps finding its way back to me, I have a feeling he doesn’t mind the extra weight at all.
It doesn’t matter what he minds or doesn’t mind, Amanda, because he is off limits in every possible way.
I hammer that thought home with a gulp of water to chase the pills, settling back into the couch as David and Greg catch up.
I’m content to just sit there as a silent bystander until my son tries to get Greg to gang up on me with him.
“Greg, help me convince my mom she needs more time to rest. She’s intent on going back to school tomorrow,” he says, giving me a look. “Meanwhile, she can’t go more than an hour without wincing in discomfort from her surgery.”
“I’m fine,” I argue. “Dr. Simmons said it’s normal to be sore, but he also said I could get back to most of my usual activities with no problem at all.”
“Mom…”
I hold up a finger. “If I’m cleared to have sex, I’m most definitely cleared to go sit in a classroom.”
“Ew,” David says with a wrinkled nose, but Greg smirks, taking a sip of his water and avoiding eye contact with me.
“I’m more concerned about riding on the bus than I am going to class,” I confess.
That gets Greg’s attention. “Bus?”
“Her car is totaled,” David clarifies. “I’m working on finding her a new one for the amount her insurance offered her, but…”
“But it was a twenty-year-old Toyota,” I finish for him. “So, it’s worth roughly the amount of the used couch cushion under my ass, if even.”
David sighs, his brows folding together, and my heart aches at the burden my son feels for me. It’s the last thing I ever want to be for him or anyone else — a burden — and yet with how badly the house is breaking down, and now my car…
“You’re going to school?” Greg muses after a long pause of silence, and I can tell by the way he looks at me that he does it to save me from getting too lost in thought.
Is he really this in tune with me, even after all the time that’s passed?
“I am,” I say with a smile.
“For?”
“Psychology. I… I want to be a therapist.”
Greg swallows, looking something between impressed and proud. “That’s amazing. Congratulations.”
I laugh at that. “Well, don’t congratulate me yet. I’m only in my second year.” I shake my head. “Turns out going to college in your forties isn’t easy.”
“You don’t have to do it,” David tries, but I pin him with a glare.
“Don’t.”
He snaps his mouth shut at that, a nod letting me know he won’t try to argue again. We’ve had this conversation far too many times. He thinks the answer is for him and his wife to find a bigger place, one with a mother-in-law suite, so I can live with them rent-free.
But I’m forty-seven, not eighty-seven.
I still have a life to live.
And I don’t want his money, or my ex-husband’s, to live it.
“Use my car.”
The glare I’m giving my son softens, and I blink, looking at Greg with my brows tugging inward. “What?”
“You can use my car,” he reiterates.
David and I both look at him like he’s crazy.
“I don’t need it,” he says with a shrug. “I mean, I live within biking distance of the hospital. I don’t really go anywhere that’s not downtown. I’ll be fine without it for a while until you get a new one.”
I blink, staring at him.
And then I burst out in laughter.
“I’m serious,” he says. “It’s really not a problem.”