CHAPTER 12 BEN
Each mile that draws us closer to Great Falls presses on a different nerve.
I feel the tension in my back, a clear reminder of my always advancing age or, perhaps, of falling off a horse earlier this week.
I don’t want to spend the weekend celebrating a wedding I don’t care to attend.
I don’t want to see my ex, the woman who hurt me so badly that I still feel the ripple effects in so many different areas of my life.
I don’t want to see how close my mother is to Tatum and feel the push I’ll never understand as she attempts to get us back together.
All I want to do is hole up in the hotel and spend the weekend with Kaylee.
“You’re quiet,” Kaylee says, piping down after belting out another country song in her off-key tone that just makes her even more endearing.
“I don’t want to go to this shit,” I admit, unlocking my clenched jaw.
“You don’t have to,” she points out. “You’re an adult.”
“I know. But she’s my mom. I don’t have to go, but I still feel the obligation to.”
“Why?”
I press my lips together as I try to dig deep to the root of the answer to her question.
“I’m not sure why. My dad mostly raised me.
I resent my mother for what she did to him.
And yet…she birthed me. I guess the little boy inside me has always sought her approval.
It’s part of what made me cling onto football when some coach said I had talent.
It’s what pushed me into improving my game all through high school and college and eventually when I was drafted into the league.
I kept waiting for her to say she was proud of me. ”
“Did she?” Kaylee asks, never one to skip over the important questions.
I shake my head as I squint at the road ahead, my chest suddenly feeling some of the tightness my back has been feeling over the last twenty miles or so. “No,” I mutter. “Sometimes I think the only thing that would make her proud of me is getting back together with Tatum.”
I feel her gaze on my profile, but I can’t meet her eyes.
“Why do you think she so badly wants you two together?” she asks.
“I have no idea,” I murmur. But maybe this weekend is a good time to figure out the answer to that question.
Instead of checking into the hotel like I would prefer to do, we drive straight to my mother’s house.
I still haven’t met the fiancé, and it’s probably better for our first meeting to take place before the rehearsal dinner so the attention can be on their impending nuptials and not on what I do for a living—since the conversation pretty much always turns that direction when I first meet someone new.
We barely pull into the driveway and the shit show has already begun. It's like Tatum was sitting in her front window waiting for me to pull into my mother’s driveway. Kaylee and I both watch her as she makes her way over. She stops in front of the Scout and offers a wave.
I don’t wave back.
I force myself to cut the engine before I back out of the driveway to run away—or worse, hit the accelerator—but before I open my door, I say to Kaylee, “Ready for this?”
She chuckles. “Nope.”
I laugh and lean across the seat to kiss her before we both get out of the car. “What are you doing here, Tatum?” I ask. “The festivities don’t start for another hour.”
“I'm just so excited for the wedding,” she says.
“I wanted to remind you that this weekend is about your mom. She's such a wonderful woman and she loves you so much. I just want to make sure this is a really special weekend for her and Jerry.” She offers a fake smile as she sets her hands on her hips with all the confidence in the world. I don’t know where that confidence comes from.
I think she might have a touch of crazy in her blood.
Or maybe more than a touch.
“What stake do you have in it?” I ask. It's awfully bossy of her to stand there warning me about how to act at my own mother’s wedding.
Kaylee walks around the car and ends up beside me. I toss a protective arm around her.
“Darlene is my best friend. Given that I am the maid of honor, I have taken it upon myself to make sure everything goes as planned. Just play nice, okay? She’s really happy.”
I hear Kaylee’s slight gasp at the admission that she’s my mother's maid of honor. I could've guessed it even though it was never stated, but it still strikes me as weird that my mother is so close to my ex.
“I promise not to ruin the wedding. Can you say the same thing?” I challenge.
“I promise to ensure everything goes off without a hitch.” There’s more of her fake, sugary smile.
“Don't you have some favors to make or something?” I ask.
“No,” she says. “It's all been done already for weeks…something you might know if you came around more often.”
“Yeah, well, you’ve given me a pretty convincing reason to stay away.
” I notice as we stand here having this conversation that she hasn't looked at Kaylee even once—not even since she moved around the Scout to my side and I tossed my arm around her. She’s kept her gaze trained very carefully on me, and the way she’s looking at me makes me nervous.
It makes me think she’s up to something.
Like she popped over when she saw the truck pull into my mother’s driveway so she could talk to me, but instead, most likely to her utter disappointment, she got me plus my fiancée.
“If you’ll excuse us,” I say, grabbing Kaylee’s hand so I can lead her toward the house, “I need to go meet the man my mother is planning to marry tomorrow.” I walk past her without another look, and I ring my mom’s doorbell.
I don’t know how long she stares at us without words or what’s going through her deranged brain, but before the door opens, she says venomously, “I need to talk to you sometime this weekend.”
I exhale as I stare at the front door. Do I pretend I didn’t hear her? Do I ignore her? No. I do neither of those things. Instead, I turn toward her. “If you want to ensure this weekend isn’t ruined, stay the fuck away from me.”
The door opens as I finish my sentence, so I don’t get the pleasure of seeing the anger on her face before I turn toward the house.
My mom tosses the door open excitedly, and she’s already dressed for the rehearsal dinner taking place in a couple hours.
At least I assume that’s why she’s wearing sequins when the sun’s still out.
Her dress is white, naturally, and it looks more like something the women I used to give attention to out back behind a club would wear rather than something appropriate for a mother with a thirty-two-year-old son to wear to a wedding rehearsal, but I’m not here to judge.
“Benny Boy!” my mom exclaims. Why is it so different hearing that stupid nickname from her mouth versus Gramma Jean’s?
It’s endearing and sweet from Gramma. From my mother…
it feels like a show—sort of like everything she does.
She hugs me, and as she does, I spot the layers of make-up and smell the overpowering scent of too much perfume.
She must glance over my shoulder, because she yells out to the driveway. “Oh, Tate! Come on in, girlfriend.”
That’s right. She addresses Tatum, but not the woman I’m actually going to marry.
Kaylee hangs in there like a trooper, my hand clutched firmly in hers, and we follow my mom into the house with Tatum’s perfume choking me from behind.
“Jer!” my mom yells into the house, and a man about a decade younger than her—maybe two decades—appears in the hallway. She walks over to him and links her arms around his neck. She plants a kiss on his cheek. “Meet my son, Benny.”
“Jerry Sharpe,” he says with a short nod, sticking his hand out to shake mine. “Big fan.”
Red flags abound. The first thing he says to me has nothing to do with the fact that he’ll be my new daddy and everything to do with the fact that I play pro football.
I won’t judge his age even though he’s probably way too young for her, but I will judge the fact that first impressions feel like he’s using her to get to me.
I’d like to say that’s just my big ego talking, but I’ve been around the block enough times to know it’s far more than that. When my gut tells me that’s what someone’s doing, I’m not sure I’ve ever been wrong.
But my mother and I aren’t close. I’m not sure why this guy would go so far as to marry her.
“Thanks,” I say, trying to tone down the awkwardness and gloss over what he just said rather than draw attention to it. I shift the focus. “You ready for the wedding?” I say it more to my mom than to Jerry.
“We’re so excited!” my mom squeals, and Jerry nods shortly. He seems to be a man of few words. Maybe my mom does have a type after all.
“Tell me about yourself, Jer,” I say, using my mother’s nickname for him once she’s ushered us inside toward the couch. Tatum hangs back and pulls my mom aside, leaving me semi-alone with Jerry and Kaylee.
“I work in heating and cooling,” he says. “Been doing that kind of work for a long time now. I have a son, Thorne, who’s seventeen.”
Thorne Sharpe?
Seriously? That’s his name? What’s his middle name? Is?
“You been married before?” I ask.
He nods. “Wife passed a few years back. Took me a long time to feel ready to move on, and then I met your mom.” He glances over at her where she stands across the room, deep in quiet conversation with my ex. “The rest is history.”
I try to find something within the glance he shoots her that tells me he’s in love with her, but it’s just…not there.
“What do you want with her?” I ask.
He looks a little offended by my question. “A life,” he says simply, but I don’t buy it.
I need to talk to her. I’m not going to ruin her big weekend, but I do want to make sure there’s not some ulterior motive here.
She doesn’t have anyone to look out for her. She’s an adult, and she can take care of herself…but that doesn’t mean she doesn’t deserve someone in her corner looking out for her—someone fully disconnected from the situation given that I’m hardly ever even around here.
I glance over at Kaylee. I don’t want her to be involved in the conversation since my mother deserves privacy for the honest talk I want to have with her, but I’m also not going to leave her vulnerable to this guy I don’t know and my ex.
“Can I talk to you outside a minute?” I ask.
She nods, and the two of us head out to the Scout.
I don’t have a choice. I hand her the keys…
something I don’t think I’ve ever done before in my life.
I’ve left my car places if I had too much to drink, but I’ve never given anyone my keys and told them to take my vehicle anywhere.
“Can you run to the grocery store and pick up some beer and whatever you want to drink?”
She narrows her eyes at me. “Why do I feel like you’re trying to get rid of me?”
“I’m trying to protect you. I want to talk to my mother alone because I feel like she’ll be honest with me that way, and I don’t want to leave you alone with Tatum or Jerry.”
“I don’t know if I’ve ever loved you more,” she says, tipping her chin up for a kiss. I give her one. “I’ll give you a half hour or so. Is that enough time?”
I nod, and then I pull her into my arms and hold her against my body for a beat. I lean my forehead down to hers, and the moment is sweet and tender...just for us. “Thank you.”
“Of course. Thank you, too.”
She moves to walk away, and I slap her ass. She giggles before she hops into the Scout. Damn, does she look good sitting in my driver’s seat.
This whole love thing really has changed me.
And now…to face the demons. Or something along those lines.