Page 218 of Falling for You
‘Just be there, Stevie!’ I say, exasperated. ‘That’s all Mom wants. I mean, man, do you thinkIknow what I’m doing? You just need to be there. Go see—’
‘I did.’
His words cut across me like a piece of glass. ‘What?’
‘I did go see Mom. Last year.’ He takes a deep breath. ‘I came back for a week. You were away with work or something, I don’t know. It was just me and Mom. I thought I’d surprise her.’
For the first time, he looks over at me and my heart turns over. It’s like looking at four-year-old Stevie again. ‘Nate, she didn’t have any idea who I was. She was terrified of me. Like, do you have any idea how that feels? For your own mom to be scared of you?’
‘What happened?’ I can feel my heart racing in my ears.
He scratches his shaved head. ‘Dad calmed her down. He tried to make me stay, said she was just having a bad day. But I left. I can’t do that to her again. She was so scared of me. She looked at me as if I was about to …’ He trails off, his voice catching. ‘And it’s my fault. If I’d been there more over the years, then maybe she …’
‘She’s not well,’ I say, forcing myself to say the words thatcircle around my mind every day. ‘That’s it, Stevie. It could have happened to me, Dad, anyone. You just caught her on a bad day. When did this happen?’
He shakes his head, swiping the tears from his eyes with the back of his hand. ‘I don’t know. Like, last October. I asked Dad not to tell you.’
‘And you haven’t seen her since?’
‘No. I message her, though!’ Stevie says defensively.
‘I get it,’ I say quickly, not wanting to start any kind of fight. ‘It’s hard. Actually, it’s worse than hard. It’s fucking shit. It’s all shit. But I need you.’ I move onto the sofa next to him, putting my arm around his shoulder. His head flops onto my chest, just like he used to do with Mom when he was a child.
‘I’m sorry, Nate,’ he says quietly. ‘I don’t think I can do it.’
‘I’ll help you,’ I say. ‘We’ll do it together.’
And for the next hour, with only the noise of the television and the odd screeching siren, we sit there together, hugging, for the first time since we were kids.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Annie
I crash into the office, snatching the tail of my scarf behind me before it gets trapped in the lift. I’ve run from a client meeting, where I showed them a couple of private schools, and raced back here so I could check my emails and say hello to Pam before the fabric shop closed.
I spent the rest of Sunday crying with Tanya and Penny. We sat and chatted, drank all the wine and then all the tea, ate all the chocolate and devoured Penny’s huge, delicious stew. But then I got up on Monday morning and decided that I wasn’t going to let Nate ruin another day. He’d already spent the majority of the week before circling around my head, while I was desperately wondering why he’d sent me such a weird message, then he crashed a weekend with my parentsandruined an entire Sunday. So, no more. He was not allowed to come with me into this week.
‘Hello!’ I call, walking through the office. To my surprise, Pam isn’t hunched over her laptop like she normally is. I drop my bag, frowning. That’s odd – normally, I barely see her move from that space.
‘Pam?’ I call. She’s in the kitchen and jumps when she sees me.
‘Are you making a cup of tea?’ I say. ‘You never get up to make a cup of tea! I haven’t been gone that long, have I?’
I grin, pulling a mug down and placing it next to hers, but she doesn’t return my smile, just looks at me with a weird, glazed expression.
‘Are you all right?’ I ask. ‘Have you been staring at your laptop for too long? Shall I take you outside for some fresh air?’
I’m teasing her, but the weird, glazed expression doesn’t shift.
‘Annie,’ she says eventually. ‘How are you?’
‘I’m fine,’ I reply at once. ‘Are you?’
She nods. ‘I’m good. Rodney and I spent the weekend going through things – the business, and the idea of travelling.’
I smile, leaning on the counter, ready for her to start her weekly rant about how Rodney wants to travel the world and she can’t leave the business. But she doesn’t.
‘I think we’re going to do it,’ she says, giving me a small smile. ‘We’re not getting any younger, and I do work too much … and I love Rodney, I want to do this with him.’
