Page 108 of Deja New
“What?”
“And yes, I’m aware that my priorities are screwed!” More kicks. More tufts of dirt. “But for some reason that’s the part that really bugs me right now!”
“It doesn’t matter.”
They both looked around and saw Jason standing fifteen feet away.
“That wasn’t half an hour,” she called.
He spread his hands. “I was worried. And it wasn’t a waste. I was glad to spend time here with you. There will be other picnics.” He smiled, flashing that dimple as he walked closer. “And other naps.”
Angela jabbed a thumb at her mother, who was glaring at him like a Scooby villain. “It’s way more fucked up than you knew, Jason.”
“Of course it is.”
Angela went to him, put her arms around his waist. Wasmore than a little relieved when he let her. “I’m gonna need so much therapy.”
“I have an excellent therapist. We can share.”
“I’ll have to move out.”
“You can’t stay with her now,” he agreed.
“And I have to think about Jack, he’s the only minor, he’ll have to come with me.”
“I have three bedrooms.”
She blinked. “Yeah?”
“Yes.”
“Just like that?”
“Just like that.”
“I think the woman who used the real-estate section to date might have been onto something.”
He laughed.
She pointed at her mother again. “This. This is the kind of obsessive madness you’re risking if you want to be with me. We’re all various degrees of crazy. I could actually turn into this woman.”
“There will be days I won’t get out of bed because my brain chemistry went haywire. Times when I’ll miss a birthday because I’m literally wading through blood at a crime scene. And I have nightmares.”
There was a pointed throat-clearing behind them.
“Oh, me, too. Not the wading-through-blood part. The bad dreams part.”
“Excuse me?”
“My father-in-law faked his own murder.”
“Excuse me.”
“My mother talked him into it,” Angela added, in case Jason wasn’t fathoming the full horror.
“We are fucked,” he decided, and she laughed.
“Angela! I’m not finished with my story.”
“It’s not your story anymore, Mom,” Angela replied without looking around. “It’s ours.”
