Bastard.
“Yes, we’ll go. Pack up your things and I’ll meet you at your truck.”
It had become habit to let him drive me around, to the point where my car hadn’t needed gas in weeks. I’d offered to chip in, but he pretended not to hear me.
I pushed him away with a soft smile and headed back to where I’d left my bag and equipment, raw footage ready to be formatted and spread to the masses for likes and shares.
As I shouldered my pack, my phone vibrated in my pocket. Expecting it to be Cian in all his eternal impatience, I answered with a smile.
“Hey.”
“My daughter lives. Thanks be to God. Where the hell have you been, Duckie? Too important to call your mother back so we don’t think you’re dead in a ditch somewhere? I guess you aren’t as smart as we thought. Either that, or you don’t care about the people who raised you.”
Goddamn it. My mood plummeted as my mother’s favorite rant about how I was the worst daughter in existence continued.
“Look, Mom, you know how busy I get once the season starts,” I cut in.
“Your sister is on set and she still finds time to call. You know she’s dating a football player now. We’re all gathering for Thanksgiving. Make sure you’re there.”
I’d never been so glad to have to wear heels for something.
“I have a charity event on Thanksgiving.”
“That’s fine. Georgia can’t make it until the thirtieth. I already checked, and you don’t have a game that night so you can get your ungrateful butt home and see your family.”
I didn’t want to go.
Things were always worse when I saw them in person. Especially if Georgia had found someone to bring home to Mom and Dad. I needed backup. I needed someone who would…
The solution hit me so hard I gasped, looking around in case anyone knew what I was thinking. Friends with benefits wasn’t an arrangement that needed to be common knowledge in the club.
“I’m bringing a plus-one.”
Silence greeted my declaration. Like what I’d said was so absurd she had to check the connection.
“Mom?”
It was my turn to check my phone, but apparently, I hadn’t shocked my mother into silence for too long.
“Sure. Bring whoever you want, but I expect you to be here at five PM sharp. You know your father likes to eat early.”
“How is Dad?” I asked. The only person under that roof I cared about took his role as patriarch seriously. He was the breadwinner. He worked all day, expected dinner on the table when he got home, and had always treated me as the son he never had. We bonded over a shared love of hockey, and while he would never interfere in the way Mom chose to raise us, my childhood had included brief moments of reprieve from the incessant judgment of my mother in the form of bonding time with dad.
“Still breathing. I would have done less time for murder.” She huffed at her own shitty joke and wrapped up the call with another warning to remember the date.
All in all, it was one of the better phone calls I’d had with her.
I wandered outside, wondering how to ask Cian to play backup with my family when even I didn’t want to go.
“You ready?” he asked as I climbed into the cab.
“Yup.”
“What’s wrong?”
A flippant comment was on the tip of my tongue, ready to deflect from my shitty life when I remembered I’d promised him the truth.
“I accidentally answered a call from my mom.”
