Page 40 of Until

“I guess I don’t have any choice.” Odessa is quiet for a moment, then glances at me, then back to the road. “Your mother showed up at the restaurant.”

“My mother? You must be mistaken. She’s dead."

Odessa shakes her head. “She looks just like you, only older and with dark hair. She showed up asking for you. She’s been there a few times already.”

I stare at Odessa, trying to understand what she’s saying.

“So she’s alive?” I said. “Grandma didn’t talk about the past much, but I grew up hearing that my parents had a car accident when I was little, and they were both drunk. Grandma never said anything more than that. I figured it was because it was too difficult for her to talk about, so I never asked any questions.”

“So you’ve never heard from her before?”

I shook my head. “Why didn’t she reach out? Didn’t she want to know how her daughter was?”

She shrugs. Maybe she didn’t know how to reach you.”

“I’ve had the same phone number for years now. And this is the same apartment I grew up in. She somehow found out I work at John’s, so she knows something. Somehow.”

I don’t know how I feel about my mother suddenly popping up, other than angry. I'm angry for how much of my life she missed, angry for her leaving when I was little, and even angrier that she’s asking about me instead of just being my mother and showing up.

We drive the rest of the way in silence while I stew about my mother.

I think about how much I would love to have a mom to talk about all of this stuff going on with Alex and Ryan. I would have loved to have a mom who helped and guided me so that I didn’t flounder and do nothing with my life. I wasn’t blaming her for my not dating or my lack of job skills, but had she been around more, I was sure my life would’ve been different.

But would it have been better?

“Hey, instead of dropping me off at the rehab, can you just bring me home?” I ask.

“Sure. You okay?.”

“Yeah, I just need some time to think.”

“I’m sorry about your mom.”

My stomach flips hearing the word ‘mom’ again, and I begin to feel a little sick, wondering why she’s back. Why now? And for how long? Deep down I know she wants something. But what?

CHAPTER 13

Ryan

“They're ready for you now, Mr. Stirling,” Caitlin, the receptionist, says.

As usual, once a month, I go through this exact thing. Nothing changes—not even how Caitlin, the receptionist, answers the phone when the trustees are ready for me.

It’s all the same, just a mirror image of it—a time loop where nothing new or interesting happens.

This time, though, it’ll be different because of Carina.

I tried to skip this meeting just a week ago, but there’s no escaping the trustees—not when marriage is on their minds.

She leads me down a familiar hall, the same hall I have been walking down every month for the past five years since my father died and left me everything.

The room is a glass box with two floor-to-ceiling walls of glass looking down at the city below. The other two walls face the building’s interior. As I walk past, I try to get a glimpse of the view, but as usual, no luck. The trustees mean business. I was only there for one reason, and that had nothing to do with my seeing a great view.

“Hello, Ryan, come in," Harold Weinberger says. “Glad you could make it this time.”

In the center of the room is a large round wooden table with twelve chairs. One for each of the knights of the Round Table. Yes, this group thinks they are that important.

One chair remains empty since my father's passing. That’s the real issue here. They want to fill the empty chair, and without his will being finalized by either my turning forty or getting married, that’s not happening. I pull Dad’s old chair out and sit down.

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