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“I knew Dad would be calmer than you. He wasn’t happy about it, but he at least listened without getting upset.”

“I’m not upset,” I said, clearly upset but trying to get it together.

“You should be happy. At least I’m dating someone my own age. Taylor sleeps with older guys.”

“That’s horrible, but I’m not Taylor’s mother. I’m your mother, and I should know everything you do.”

“Well, next year when I go to college, you won’t know anything. Besides, you always said it was my body and I should make my own decisions about it.”

“I said that when I thought you weren’t going to have sex. I gave birth to you, so until you’re eighteen, your body is mine.” Okay, that sounded nuts.

“This is ridiculous. It’s my life, and you need to stay out of it and get one of your own.” She ran up the stairs and slammed her bedroom door. I stopped myself from hitting my hand down on the table again because it still hurt from before.

Gia didn’t come out of her room for hours, and when I offered her dinner, she declined, which was good because I was afraid I’d poison her. At eight o’clock, Jim came home, and before he even put his keys on the hook, I said, “You told Gia it was a good idea to have sex with Jason?”

“What’re you talking about? I never said that.”

“She said you didn’t try to talk her out of it.”

“She didn’t tell me she was going to. All she said was she was thinking about it, and I told her that it was a big decision and she couldn’t go back once she did it.” Okay, that was reasonable. “Are you saying she went through with it?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Oh God. What did you say to her?”

“When she told me, I was shocked. I don’t think I handled it well. Hopefully I didn’t shame her.”

“There’s nothing wrong with a little shame.” He gave me a halfhearted smile. “Should I go talk to her?” he asked.

“I wouldn’t. There’ll be plenty of time to talk to her later, since I’m chaining her door closed.” He kissed me on the cheek. The kiss wasn’t as tender and warm as the one from Michael, but it was something. When Jim reached for a bottle of wine from the cabinet, I said, “Maybe we should start with whiskey.”

CHAPTER 16

Iturned over in bed and was accosted by a furry lick going up and down my nose, pausing almost purposefully at my nostrils for a little too long. Theo had no manners when he was hungry. Couldn’t he see it was Saturday morning, and I didn’t have to be anywhere? He moved to the other side of the bed, jumped up, and put his front paws on the mattress, staring at me as if to say, “I only eat once every twelve hours. Have a heart.” As I gazed at his droopy, mournful face, the phone rang. Like clockwork, it was my mother. Why couldn’t she take the weekends off? I picked up because I knew if I avoided answering, she was only going to try to track me down. She gave me the daily update on my father, an update I especially tried to avoid on weekends. The home was moving him to the memory care unit this week. The more time that went on, the more helpless I felt, and hearing about it every day made things worse.

I got off the phone as quickly as I could. Jim was not on his side of the bed, or in the bathroom. He liked to sleep later than I did on weekends, so where was he? Then I heard the clanging of pots and pans. I was the only one who cooked, so who was touching my pots? Maybe I was being surprised with breakfast in bed? But it wasn’t my birthday… or Mother’s Day. As I thought about what it would be like to have someone serve me, Jim came into the room with a cup of coffee. I propped up the pillows behind my back and sat up, my pajamas askew from a good night’s sleep.

He put the coffee on the side table. “You were completely unconscious when I woke up. I was worried you were dead.”

“If you were so worried, why didn’t you try to wake me?”

“I figured if you were already dead, there was no rush.”

I threw my pillow at him. He picked up the cup of coffee. “Is that for me?” I asked expectantly.

“Uh, it can be. …”

My disappointment was palpable, but I tried to hide it. “That’s okay.”

“You sure?” he said as he took a sip from the cup. I could smell the aroma and wished I’d admitted I wanted it.

He took off his pajama bottoms and stood naked from the waist down. I was definitely sexually deprived, because every ounce of my anger at him took a vacation. Or at least it was about to take a vacation until after we had sex.

“So … what should we do this morning?” I asked in what I thought was my sexiest voice. I gave him a come-hither look, but since I hadn’t done that look in a long time, it was possible I looked like a drunken sailor.

Jim, not picking up on my sexy vibe, or not turned on by a drunken sailor, rifled through his drawer for underwear and socks. “I don’t know. What do you want to do?” He went into the bathroom and left the door open while he peed. My sexy feeling took a bow and left the stage. Through the sounds of the toilet flushing, he said, “Can you make your amazing waffles this morning? I already got the waffle iron out.”

“Okay. Do we have bacon?” I asked.