Page 54 of Ghosted By Texas

“The school board is splitting my time between Whitmore and Jarvis next year.” Jarvis was the middle school that housed sixth through eighth grade students. “I’ll be at the middle school on Tuesdays and Thursdays and the elementary the other three days of the week.”

“That’s dumb. Why would they do that?”

“Funding cuts. Neither school had enough funding for a full-time art teacher, so they got together and decided to split it. I lucked out because Tommy Owens, who was teaching at the middle school this year, put in his resignation. He plans to move to be with his fiancé who got a job out of state. Otherwise, we would have been in competition for the same split position.”

“Becs!” Clea sighed. “Why didn’t you tell me your job was on the line?”

I shrugged. “Seems like all I’ve had lately is bad news. I thought maybe if I kept it to myself, everything would turn out okay, and it did.”

“Oh, Becs.”

Mrs. Mercer sat there taking everything in with sadness dripping from her eyes. I could feel the energy she put out, and while it wasn’t hostile toward me, I don’t think she knew what to do with my sorry-luck lot in life.

“What about your parents? How are they with the recent news?”

“Well, I don’t talk to them that much, so they didn’t know about my job situation either,” I informed her, being purposely obtuse.

She chuckled. “You remind me a little of Dallas.”

“Hush your mouth. I do not remind you of Cupid Satan,” I told her before remembering that she was the idiot’s mother.

Clea couldn’t hold back her laughter and Mrs. Mercer joined in. “You know, I was just informed about my son’s diaper wearing tendencies this very night. I really thought I’d raised my children better, but turns out, you can do your best and they’ll still find ways to embarrass or disappoint. As a mom, you must learn to roll with it. There will be moments of great celebration with them too that make up for the times where you just want to bury them in the backyard.”

She patted Clea’s thigh. “Despite finding out my youngest son attends parties in diapers, I did learn that I’m getting a new daughter-in-law soon.” Then she turned her eyes back to meet mine. “And my first grandbaby.” The warmth and love in that statement squeezed at my heart. “So, you see, all in one night I got to be disappointed in my son while also finding out there is much to celebrate. That’s what being a mother is all about.”

I nodded my head and we all sat in awkward silence for a moment, probably picturing Dallas in his diaper, because let’s face it that was the craziest part of what she’d found out. Plus, for my part, I didn’t want to think about what my pregnancy might mean where this woman was concerned. She seemed happy about it, but I didn’t know her, and she was a fan of the Jordan and Austin coupling, so I would have to tread lightly there.

“I don’t care if you’re with my son, but you need to know that we will consider you family too, Becs. If you need anything, we will be there. I’m speaking for my whole family.”

“I appreciate that, but also don’t want to make things awkward.”

“There is nothing awkward about it. You are the mother of my future grandchild. If you need something, all you have to do is ask. There is no need for you to be in this alone.” She glanced back over to Clea. “Though, I know you have a pretty good best friend at your back, I want you to know that our family is there as well. Even if Austin isn’t to be trusted by your heart any longer, I hope you’ll give the rest of our clan the benefit of the doubt and allow us to be there for you.”

“Well, Houston has already had my back, and I worried that it would cause a rift between your sons, so I try to keep to myself.”

“Don’t you worry about a thing. Whether you believe it or not, I think it would cause a bigger rift if Austin thought his brother was taking his side instead of yours.”

We all sat there stewing in that thought for a few more minutes before Mrs. Mercer clapped her hands together excitedly. “Now, I hear that you had pictures of the little one done recently, and I would love it if you could share them with me.”

The way she said it made me laugh, as if we’d gone to a photography studio instead of having a wand shoved in unmentionable places to get images of the fetus I was carrying.

“The pictures they give are nothing like seeing it in person,” I stupidly explained to the mother of five as I got up to go get the sonogram pictures. I brought them back and handed them to her. “We saw the heart beating and everything,” I leaned in and pointed to the spot. “That’s it right there,” I announced proudly.

“Oh, would you look at that,” the woman sniffed, growing weepy as she looked at my blob with so much love already in her eyes. Dammit, that meant moving away on the sly wouldn’t be an option. My little blob would need this woman in his or her life. I had a feeling that I might, too. Since my own mother would never be a font of parenting knowledge to go to in a crisis.

“November sixth,” she said wistfully when she noticed my due date. “This Christmas will be an extra special event.”

That announcement sent me stumbling all the way back to plop down in my chair completely stunned. How many Christmases would I lose my child to their other family? What about birthdays? Oh, man. I really hadn’t imagined the shared custody reality to its fullest yet.

“Becs?” Clea called out to me. “Are you okay?”

“No,” I answered truthfully.

“What did I say?” Mrs. Mercer sounded concerned that she’d upset me.

“I think I know,” Clea informed her. “You talked about Christmas and it just hit Becs that she’ll have to share the baby with Austin and you guys and that she might not be the one to have them on the holidays.”

“Oh dear,” Mrs. Mercer huffed. “Don’t you go worrying over silly things like that. You will always be invited to our home for the holidays, if you choose to attend. If you don’t, we will respect your wishes and simply celebrate our holiday on another day. I would never deny you seeing the excitement of a child on Christmas morning.”

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