Page 70 of Take Me Away, Cowboy

“Actually, he didn’t have to. I met him and without knowing it, my dreams shifted. Traveling was incredible, don’t get me wrong, and it gave me memories I’ll never forget, but your father was everything I never knew I wanted.”

Paige’s thoughts went to Owen for a reason she didn’t want to examine too closely at that moment. But it wasn’t lost on her that he was her first reaction to her mom’s news.

“You’re a sap, Mom, and I never knew it.” Paige teased, but her gut churned with unasked questions. This news was jarring in a life-changing way.

“Love will do that to you. I hope you find that, Paige. It doesn’t have to be here, but I hope you find someone who makes you rethink everything you thought you knew. And I hope you welcome him into your life, no matter how scary that might be. It won’t be a compromise when it’s right, but things will look different from what you thought they would. That’s okay, you know.”

Paige thought for a moment before posing her last question.

“Do you have any regrets? Staying here?”

“No.”

“None?” Paige didn’t believe that lie from the generation before her, the one that said, “my mistakes led me to you, so how could they be bad?” That was bullshit as far as she was concerned. Just an excuse to relinquish accountability.

“Not one. And not because of the reasons you might think,” Marge said. “I made mistakes, sure, and have some regrets about how I handled my relationships. Maybe I was too hard on you, soft on Brad, maybe I could be gentler with your father. But I made the choice to stay here on purpose and with conviction. I knew what was out there, what I was leaving behind. It simply came down to what I couldn’t live without. Leaving your father for even the greatest adventure wasn’t ever a possibility I was willing to consider.”

“I wish I’d known all this sooner,” Paige said, her voice cracking, wistful.

“You can’t live according to the rules I made for myself, Paige. You have to make your own, decide what it is you can’t live without. And be prepared to fight for that at any cost.”

“At any cost…” Paige echoed, her voice and thoughts far away, drifting to a man most likely sleeping next door to her apartment. A man with coarse hair that peppered his chest and muscles that rippled under his skin, whose nightmares shifted to dreams beneath his eyelids. A man she’d known she’d fallen in love with and still let walk out of her life.

“I’m sorry for bombarding you like this, but when you got sick, then your father…” Her mom shook her head, wiping her own tears from puffy eyes. “I didn’t have enough time to realize you’ll be okay. It wasn’t enough time, Paige-O. It never is when you love someone like I love you.”

“I love you, too, Mom. And don’t worry about Dad. He’ll be okay. I’ll help as much as I can. Brad will too, if that little shit recovers after tonight.”

“So, he got pretty drunk, did he?” Marge asked, smiling weakly, her arm still around Paige. She let it fall, used her hands to rub Paige’s arms.

“That’s an understatement, like alaughableunderstatement, Mom. Do you know what made him go on a bender like that? He doesn’t even drink more than a glass of rosé at Thanksgiving.”

“I have no idea. He was picking up Owen, but that’s all I know. I suspect you know more on that account than I do, hon.” Paige glanced down, her cheeks burning with shame. Everything her mother had asked her to do she’d gone and done the opposite. “All I’ll say about that is that he’s a good man, Paige. Like your father.”

“Good man or not, if he got Brad hammered so he could feel better about himself and what happened between him and I, I won’t forgive him. That’s some college-level bullshit.”

“I agree, but hear him out before you go too far down a path you can’t walk back from. From what Brad said, he needed the guys’ advice about something. Didn’t say what, but it didn’t sound like Owen’s problems started the whole thing.”

“I wonder if it’s Julia,” Paige said. She meant to keep that thought to herself, but the late hour and the confessions from her mom had moved her, made it harder to keep her wits about her.

“What do you mean? What’s Julia got to do with any of this?”

“Mom, I know how you feel about her, about her mom and how they both walk on water, but I saw her in Caldwell holding hands with Chris. I just thought Brad should know.”

Marge sighed, her hand going up to stop the conversation.

“Julia and Chris have been friends for years, Paige. Them holding hands is not an indication of anything more than a reflection of that friendship.”

“Sure, Mom. If they were with Brad. Or in Banberry. But they were coming out of a restaurant in Butte, alone, holding hands and walking close enough for their shoulders to touch. And it ended with a kiss. I thought it warranted at least a mention to Brad so he can look into it.”

“And if it’s nothing?”

“Then it’s nothing, and I let it go, end of story.”

“What if it causes a rift in their relationship? Could you forgive yourself?” Marge’s tone shifted a hundred and eighty degrees since she’d started talking to Paige outside the hospital.

“How could I forgive myself if I didn’t and he found out later something was going on? I mean, wouldn’t you want to know?”

“Well, of course, if there was something to know. But I’m sure there isn’t. I would have heard from Betsy.”

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