Page 96 of All the Right Things

“Yeah, uhm, that’s what I was calling to talk to you about. I didn’t want it to come as a complete surprise when I told you, but you’ve been pretty unreachable all week.”

“What’s going on, Cheryl?” I ask, beginning to lose my patience.

“Well, after the funeral, things sort of got all messed up for Stacy, and they lost their home. So, I’m letting her and Mikey stay with me until they get back on their feet.” She says the words quietly as if worried I’m going to get mad.

Good. She should be worried because I am pissed.

“So, Stacy, the home-wrecking whore, calls you, and you just let her move in. You’re giving that piece of trash a place to live?”

Now, she starts to get defensive. “I’m giving my grandson and his mother a place to live.”

“After everything that she did? How could you do this to me?” Tears are stinging my eyes.

“Andi, I’m not doing anything to you. I’m doing this to have a relationship with my grandson.”

“And Stacy? You want to tell me that you haven’t gotten to know her at all? Are you taking in another stray like you did with me all those years ago?” My tears are now spilling over. “Was I not special at all?”

“That’s not it, Andi. You will always be special to me…but so is my grandbaby.”

“And that’s something I could never give you, right?”

Her voice goes quiet. “Andi, you know I would never put that on you. That’s never been your fault.”

I sniffle. “But now, you have what you wanted…a grandson and a surrogate daughter who can give you more.”

With that, I hang up the phone. I expect her to call back, but the phone stays silent.

I wish I could say that I’m overreacting, but honestly, it doesn’t feel that way. It feels like a woman who I think of as my mother is living with a woman who completely destroyed everything that I knew. It feels like Stacy was able to give everyone in my life all the things that I couldn’t.

Suddenly, my amazing day has been overshadowed by the bad. I just want to curl up in a ball and cry.

Chapter Forty-one

Jonas

When I get home from the ranch, I expect to find Andi, but she’s not anywhere to be found. I figured she’d head back to the office when she got out of her meeting, but I haven’t seen her.

Pulling out my phone, I see that she sent me a text about an hour ago.

Andi: Went to my place.

I figure that maybe her meeting didn’t go so well, and it’s put her in a bad mood. I quickly take a shower to wash the dirt of the day off me. I’m stressed as shit, and I’m trying not to take it out on her. She doesn’t deserve the brunt of my bad mood.

After I’m showered and ready to go, I head on over. Beau is asleep on the couch, so I leave him there and go alone.

When I knock, she yells at me to come in. When I do, she’s sitting on the couch watching something on TV. It looks like some kind of True Crime show or something.

“Hey, beautiful,” I greet.

“Hi.”

“You okay?” I ask.

“Nope.”

I sit down on the couch next to her. “You want to tell me about it?”

I’m preparing myself to give her the speech about how not every meeting leads to a deal, and that’s okay. We will just try again. But apparently, that’s not her issue.

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