Page 88 of Off Limits

“Everything okay, sweetheart?”

“Yup. All good.”

“Tough customer?”

“Mom, would you risk a friendship for love?” I turn to her, blurting it out. I don’t know why I’m asking her of all people.

For the first time in months, Mom looks at me. Really looks at me, her eyes penetrating mine. “I’m not sure love is worth risking anything for.”

My heart slides down to the floor and I want to go right along with it. Possibly stupidly, I was hoping for some motherly advice. I know it’s asking a lot with how things have been for almost two years. But I so desperately need my mom to be my mom again. I don’t know who else I can turn to.

“Oh. Okay. Thanks. I guess I’ll just—"

“It’s Lochlyn, isn’t it?” My eyes widen as I look at her.

“How did you…"

“I know I’m not around a lot anymore, I know I’m…distracted. But I still see you and notice you, Shay. You’re my daughter, I love you. I still pay attention to you. To what’s going on with you. I can see the way you look at him, the way he looks at you. And that’s just in the confines of this store.” She opens her arms wide.

“I know you’ve had him over more than once recently, and he’s spent the night. I’m not mad. I’m not going to tell you he can’t. You’re nineteen; I trust you to make good choices, to be safe. Don’t feel like you have to hide it from me. He doesn’t have to sneak out in the morning.” My heart is racing and my breaths are shallow. She knows?

“Chelsea doesn’t know.”

“I assumed as much. I’ve been careful not to tell her.”

“How long have you known?”

“I had an inkling around Christmas that something had happened. He watched you very closely at Thanksgiving. I had a feeling when you went to visit in February. I’ve known him for sixteen years, so I know when his birthday is. I truly knew in March.

“You know your father—" Choking up, she stops, putting a hand to her mouth. Almost two years later and she can still barely talk about him. Tears in her eyes, she clears her throat. “Your father always thought that Lochlyn held a torch for you. I brushed him off, told him he was seeing things. I guess he was right.”

“Yeah, yeah, he definitely was.” My voice has grown quiet. “I miss him.”

“I do too, honey. I do too.”

“I don’t know what to do, Mom. Chelsea is so against Lochlyn and I being together. But I’m so in love with him.” The last words come out in a gust of air, as though they’re coming from the very depths of my soul.

“You haven’t been together very long.” There’s a disapproving tone in her voice.

“Maybe not. But we’ve known each other for most of our lives.”

“The only thing I can tell you is that it needs to be worth it. To love at all. I was with your father for almost thirty years and suddenly he was gone. It’s not the sort of pain I’d wish on you.”

“Was it worth it? To love Daddy, knowing how it ended?”

The deafening silence says way more than her words could have. “I need to get back to this.” She hasn’t answered. It stings in a way I didn’t think possible.

“Okay.”

“Shay, just be careful. I won’t say anything to Chelsea, but she’s going to be hurt and mad when she finds out, especially since it’s been so long. You need to decide if you really think he’s worth it.” Her words stop me before I make it out the door. But I don’t look back at her as I walk through it.

I’m left with the difficult process of having to reconcile how to make my relationship work with Chelsea’s knowledge it exists. Yet all I can think is that at some point I’m going to have to make an impossible choice between two very different kinds of love. The love of my best friend, who is more like a sister, or who I’m pretty sure is the love of my life.

Chapter 16

LochlynandIarealways careful to not get caught. Mom is always busy, nobody else suspects anything, and it’s going great. Until the day it isn’t.

We’re in my room, Mom’s at work, Chelsea’s with Brendan. I took the day off from work, claiming I was worn out. Really, I just feel like Lochlyn and I haven’t been getting any real alone time together all summer and I need a day with just him.

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