Page 67 of The Sweet Spot

“You’re not,” I said with a smile.

“I think I am. And I want you to know that I’ve never seen either of you happier. I want the best for both of you.”

“Thanks, Tangi. And like I said, I’m moving on and forgetting all about it.”

“Good. Fresh starts are good.”

I was finally feeling a part of something, and that felt good too.

Chapter Thirty-Three

Wolseley

We put Christmas behind us. The next thing I had to look forward to was a week home. Brandon had a ridiculously long road trip that coincided with some kind of curling tournament at Graham Place, so he would be gone twelve days. I took full advantage and booked a flight to see my parents and my brother’s family. I couldn’t wait to see Mom and Dad. We did video calls all the time, but it wasn’t the same.

As with any trip I took abroad, Mom and Dad were there to pick me up at the airport. They hugged me so tightly it was hard to breathe. On the drive home, I told them all about Vancouver, what Tangi and Jill were up to, and, of course, all about Brandon. I left out the part about his parents. I didn’t think Mom and Dad needed to know that.

“You look happy, sweetheart,” Dad said. “That makes us happy.”

“It’s been a weird last six months,” I said. “The restaurant, Daniel, moving to Vancouver for a job, becoming a personalchef, falling in love with Brandon. Last summer, I thought I’d hit bottom, and look at me now.”

“We are so proud of you,” Mom said, hugging the life out of me again.

When we got to the house, my brother and his family were there. I got to spend time with my little niece and nephew, and while Mom, Dad, and Jen were busy with them, Craig pulled me aside.

“I have to tell you something,” he said. “Let’s go somewhere private.”

This sounded ominous. I followed him to my bedroom, and we closed the door behind us. Unlike Vancouver and its mild weather, it was freezing cold outside and hardly a place for us to talk unless we wanted a healthy dose of frostbite. Craig leaned up against my dresser and had pain etched on his face. I was starting to worry that someone was sick. Mom and Dad? One of Craig’s kids? Jen?

“I don’t want you to get mad at me.”

Oh god. This was a terrible way to start a conversation.

“What have you done?” I asked. Craig didn’t usually do anything reckless, so he had me on edge.

“Things changed for me when I had kids, and if you have kids one day, I think you’ll understand this. I want them to be happy and healthy, and to know what they are dealing with if something ever comes up. I know you get asked, too, about family histories and everything, but I had to know, so I looked into our birth parents.”

I couldn’t stop myself from frowning. Craig and I had made a pact a long time ago not to find them. They didn’t want us, so why should we want them in our lives? I didn’t so much harbor resentment; it was more about not complicating my life with people who had made a choice not to be our parents. I didn’t hate them, but I also didn’t need them.Besides, we had the best parents two foster kids could have. But at the same time, I could appreciate where he was coming from. We knew nothing about our pasts, or not much, anyway.

“Did you find them?” I asked.

“I did. Before you ask, I ran all this past Mom and Dad before I even did it. I wasn’t going to keep anything from them.”

“They were okay with it?”

“They understood.”

I thought of Brandon’s parents for a moment. That thought scared me. If our birth parents were anything like Peter and Susan … “Did you connect with them?”

“I did with our birth mother. I talked to her once. Wols, I respect you and love you to death, so if you don’t want to know, I won’t tell you. I just didn’t want to blindside you at some point down the road.”

I looked out the window. Night had fallen, but it was cloudy outside, and the snow always reflected the light a little. I’d left the rain of Vancouver to feet and feet of snow for Minnesota, and while the cold had been a shock to my system, I found it comforting as well.

I looked at Craig. “What did she say?”

He let out a sigh of relief. “She told me that she was never married to our father. That he walked out on her after you were born. She couldn’t make ends meet, and her family couldn’t help her because they had nothing to help with, so she gave us up. She said it was hard, that she thought about us all the time. I told her we had good lives and incredible parents. That made her happy. I asked about family history and what she could tell me about our birth father’s. I wrote it all down so I would have a record of it.”

“She was nice?”

---