Page 15 of Reverb

“Grammar,” she chided me, following me through the door and closing it behind her. Mom had a thing about me speaking properly. She didn’t want the other kids at school to think I was “low class.” The teachers nagged me about my speech, and the kids teased me. One of my stepfathers had been an asshole about it. I got so weird about it, wondering if I was saying the wrong thing, that I stopped talking at all. When I was silent, people left me alone.

I walked down the hall to the kitchen, noting that the cupboards looked worn and the stove was getting old. I’d need to do some upgrades soon. “You said there’s an outlet not working?” I was no electrician, but I could Google. Or call someone. If I left it to Mom, she’d get ripped off by some smooth-talking repairman, and the problem still wouldn’t be fixed. It was faster just to take over.

“Oh.” Mom followed me into the kitchen. “It works again. Isn’t that weird? Must have been some random thing.”

I turned to look at her. She was wearing jeans with sparkly thread in the seams, a braided leather belt, and a T-shirt that said Rock N Roll Mama on it. Her hair was tied up messily on top of her head and she had her reading glasses perched in it. She was crazy vain about those glasses. She was wearing mascara, shiny eyeshadow, face powder. She was a good-looking woman, but a lot of people judged my mother, took one look at how she dressed and how much makeup she wore and decided she was trash. Anyone who did that in front of me did it with their teeth kicked in.

“If you want me to visit, just say you want me to visit,” I told her. “You don’t have to make stuff up.”

“It wasn’t working,” she argued stubbornly. “Now it is. Besides, I don’t like living alone. You know that. I liked it better a few months ago when you lived here.”

“I was under house arrest, and this is my address on record. I had to live here or go to jail.”

“Still.” She frowned, her penciled brows lowering in annoyance. “It was better. We had some good times.” That was debatable, but I didn’t bother to argue. “I don’t know why you have that apartment when you could just live here. Your room’s just like you left it.”

“Diana, I don’t live in my old room because I’m almost forty.”

“Jeez, you don’t have to get mouthy. You didn’t come to meet Anthony.”

“No, I didn’t. I don’t want to meet Anthony.”

“That’s okay.” She patted her pockets, an automatic gesture of looking for her cigarettes, though she wasn’t supposed to have any. “He and I are having a fight right now, anyway. He said my cooking’s bad, can you believe it? I said he was an asshole, and now we’re not talking. Do you think my cooking’s bad?”

Her cooking was terrible, just the worst. I’d learned early to feed myself to avoid yet another recipe involving canned cream of mushroom soup. If I ever saw that stuff again, I’d throw up. “Your cooking is fine.”

“Damn right it is. So you’ll stay for dinner?”

I’d been here two minutes, and already I was fucking exhausted. “No, I can’t stay. I have plans.”

Her eyebrows shot up, but this was the truth. I was glad I’d accepted Angie’s dinner invitation, because it gave me an excuse to leave without having to lie.

“A date?” Mom asked.

“Not a date. Dinner with my new agent.”

“The blond?”

I blinked at her in surprise. “How do you know what my new agent looks like?”

Mom looked a bit smug. “You don’t know everything, Stoney. I met Miller, remember? He was nice to me, and we talked a few times. He told me about his daughter, the model who became an agent, like him. He was proud of her. I looked her up. She’s a looker.” She waggled her eyebrows. “You could do worse.”

Holy hell. I’d never regretted anything the way I regretted telling Mom that I was having dinner with Angie. I had no idea she knew who Angie was. “I told you, it’s not a date. It’s just dinner. She’s our new agent and we need to talk business.”

“If it’s business, are the other boys coming?” She smiled when I didn’t answer. “I didn’t think so.”

“Mom, knock it off.”

“I can’t help it. I want grandkids.”

“Not happening.”

“Stoney!” Now she pretended to be hurt. “You don’t have to be rude.”

She was my mom, and she’d done the best she could—was still doing the best she could—but the thought of her babysitting any kid of mine gave me hives. Almost as much as the thought of me being a father gave me hives. Given the examples I’d grown up with, I could no more be a father than I could walk on the moon.

“Give it up,” I said, a little roughly so she’d get the idea. I headed down the hall toward the door. “I’m gonna be single forever. Get used to it.”

“Some girl’s gonna snap you up!” Mom called after me, laughing. “A smart one, I bet!”

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