Page 39 of Structure of Love

Zar: Good for you. Stick to that, bro

Gage: Trust me I will

12

Gage

Since I had an inspection this morning in Romeo, I didn’t get up early or try to stop by the office. No point, what with me having to be on the road by nine, so I slept in a little. Might as well.

I was also trying to avoid my phone, if I was being honest.

I deliberately avoided looking at either my call or text history before I hopped in the shower. I continued to ignore it afterward. In fact, I ignored it right up until I was dressed, hair gelled, and eating a breakfast of cereal and coffee. Only then, with coffee and sugar in my system, did I finally drag my phone closer and take a look. I felt about as enthusiastic as I would about jabbing a needle into my eye. Needs must, I guessed?

I needed to know what kind of reaction my mother had to last night’s events to know how to handle it.

Well, to start with, I had about twenty missed calls. From her and Cooper, but mostly her.

With a sigh—because let’s face it, the text messages would be worse—I opened my texts. Yeah, as expected, there were a lot of messages.

Mom:Gage where are you?

Mom:Answer your phone.

Mom:Why is Zar picking up Cooper, that’s YOUR responsibility.

Mom:Zar wouldn’t even talk to me, just threw Cooper inside! Like he’s trash!

Ooh, good job, Zar. I’d buy him a cookie later.

Mom:Why are you doing this? He’s your baby brother!!!!

Mom:Gage answer your damn phone.

Mom:ANSWER YOUR PHONE

She carried on in this vein for a while before she texted a three-paragraph wall of accusations, crying, and guilt trips. Wow, the manipulation was thick enough to slice and grill. She must have been determined. I, for one, didn’t have the patience to text that many words. I’d switch to email and a keyboard for anything over three sentences.

My brain was disassociating right now, as I felt no emotional response to the words she’d sent me. Or my give-a-fuck had finally broken down. Either way, I felt almost analytical as I read through her wall of text. Yeah, nothing in there was worth saying. It was all guilt trips and manipulation tactics. Things that used to work on me but no longer did.

Shaking my head, I kept her muted and finished my breakfast. I focused on getting myself out the door with all my stuff, loading into the truck. I entered the address into the GPS on the dash and pulled onto the highway, as Romeo was a bit of a trip for me. Nothing too bad, about an hour’s drive from where I lived. I charged a travel fee for anything over an hour, as traveling for more than that generally wasn’t worth my time. But this was within parameters and a repeat client—a real estate agent I’d worked with in the past. For her, I didn’t mind the trip.

Something about driving helped my brain unwind. I thought a lot during drives like this, letting my mind consider things from all angles.

Logan was right about how I’d become the emotional punching bag for my family. I guessed Cooper had learned this inability to face his own problems, his own choices, from our mother. She certainly couldn’t seem to shoulder any responsibility. What had made them this way? I didn’t get it, I really didn’t. I’d be horrified if I left a responsibility in another’s hands, even accidentally. Doing it on purpose was...wow.

They could manage paying their bills, working, all of that. They just didn’t want to. They wanted me to do it. Was it easier to browbeat me into doing everything for them? I wouldn’t have thought so, considering how resistant I’d become in the past year to helping them with anything. Did they keep pushing out of habit? Or because they hoped I’d fold again and do everything for them, because that was more convenient?

Well, they were wrong.

It was probably time for me to communicate that.

I’d never known anyone who’d gone low or no contact with their families except Asher. Of course, Asher had done so in a very dramatic, public way. Thankfully, the rest of my friends had good parents and families, so they weren’t dealing with this kind of crap. I didn’t know if there was a right or wrong way to talk to my family.

I knew how I wanted to handle it. I wanted to communicate with them where they had failed me and how our relationship was going to look from now on.

I pressed the button on the dash to call my mother’s number and let it ring, mentally rehearsing my opening line.

She picked up quickly. No doubt she’d hovered around her phone all morning, waiting for me to call her back.