Chapter 33
Jameson tickles my back as I lie on my side with him behind me.
He's telling me about his parents, whom he was very close to. He has deep regrets with being so far away from them toward the end, only talking to them on the phone during the last year or so of their lives. They were getting older, and he beats himself up for not being there more.
Perhaps another reason for him wanting to slow down.
A small part of me feels guilty, knowing my mother is perfectly well and alive and I don’t make any effort to talk to her.
I make more effort with the cashier at my favorite grocery store than I do with her.
But it’s only a very small wave of guilt.
She wouldn’t reciprocate anything I tried to offer, anyway.
“Your parents sound great. I bet they were the type who had a homemade breakfast ready for you every morning, huh? Before sending you off to school.”
Not that I do that every morning.
“Yeah. They did.” He smiles fondly at some distant memory. “What about yours?”
“I was lucky if my mom left a Pop-tart out for me. I was usually on my own,” I state matter-of-factly. “Unless my dad didn’t have to work. Then he’d be out there cooking, and she’d actually show her face.”
“I’m sorry,” he says, placing a kiss on my back and continuing to run gentle hands along it.
“It’s okay. A lack of breakfast was the least of her transgressions.
I was capable of doing that, after all. It’s just a lifetime of selfish patterns that all added up to me realizing…
she’s just a selfish person. I think she put a little more effort in when we were younger…
I do have a few fond memories of her then.
But that’s why my dad didn’t leave her even sooner, I think. ”
I surprise myself with my openness. I don’t usually share all that stuff. I worry people won’t get it, that they’ll think I’m exaggerating or being too hard on her. But it’s how I always felt, and Jameson listens attentively.
“Do you think you realized it more when you became a mom yourself? Did you get madder at her then, knowing how much better you were to your kid?”
“How do you know I’m better?”
I flip over to face him. He smiles at me in an intimate, warm way. “I just know.”
I match his smile, sleepy-eyed. “Yes. I did get angrier then. For a while. Everything I do is for my kid. I made the choice to have her, and now I want to give her the world. I mean, within reason. I still get my one or two nights a week to do whatever I want. But usually it’s nothing, and I end up missing her or feeling guilty.
The only thing that’s stopped me from calling that whole arrangement off is that my dad and Ella absolutely adore her, and she adores her time with them. It’s good for her.”
“Did you ever want another one?”
“Sometimes. But I’m happy with just Jess, too. It would take the right person, because I’m not going through that all over again.”
“And that is?”
I release whatever breath is left in my lungs.
“Long story short? Her dad was a one-night stand. A military guy I met in Vegas when I was nineteen and he was twenty-three. It was hard for me to even track him down once I found out, but once I did, he wanted me to get rid of her. I had already made up my mind at that point that I was keeping her, so it was irrelevant. And he was so pushy about it. Like, extremely pushy. I was so mad. So, I told him not to worry, that I’d be doing it on my own.
He still wasn’t happy, but I didn’t care.
When I had her…I didn’t even put his name on the birth certificate.
It’s blank. She’s asked about her dad once or twice, and I was honest with her.
He was a one-time mistake who wasn’t emotionally stable enough to be a father. ”
He’s stopped tickling my stomach, and I give him a forced smile.
“That’s…awful.”
“It’s not all bad,” I shrug. “I like how my life ended up. For the most part.”
“And you never heard from him again?”
I hesitate, looking down at my hands. “I tracked him down again. Once.”
Jameson waits for me to go on.
“After she was diagnosed. I thought…we were so young, maybe he had changed his mind. I wanted to give him another chance to be in his daughter’s life.” I shake my head.
“That—”
“Yeah. He didn’t care. Didn’t care about her diagnosis, didn’t care to know anything. Seemed bothered that I even called. So that was it for me. Besides, he knew my name all that time. He could have contacted me at any moment if he wanted to. Still can. But he won’t.”
“I’ll never understand some men…” he trails off, shaking his head.
“It’s really okay. We’re fine. It was a little hard at first, but she’s become so smart and independent, she practically raises herself,” I joke. “The days are long, but the years are short.” That’s one of my favorite things my dad always says, because it feels painfully accurate.
“It can’t be easy watching them grow older. Needing you less and less.”
“It’s not. I get really sad about it if I think about it for too long.
You never realize in the moment when it’s the last time they crawl into your bed for a snuggle or say a certain word so funny and cute for the last time.
Not until one day, maybe years later, and you suddenly remember the way she used to say ‘bagghetti.’ And then you have a good cry.
” I finish my rambling with a laugh, and he joins me.
There’s a look of admiration in his eyes as he smiles at me. I’m not sure I deserve it, but I’ll take it just the same. “See? I knew you were a great mom.” He kisses the top of my head, then sits up.
“I should probably go,” he says with dismay. Good. He doesn’t want to leave, and I don’t want him to.
“You don’t…you don’t have to…”
“If we fall asleep and Jess finds us in the morning…”
I press my lips together tightly, hesitating before I grab his hand.
“Stay…please? Besides, I think your car is hidden on the side of the house. I didn’t see it anywhere earlier.”
“Okay.” He gives me a sleepy smile, hesitates, then caves, lying back down beside me. I turn over and he spoons me. I’m asleep within minutes.