Page 56 of Wicked Love

When the service ends, I stay behind, thanking people for coming. My guys stay with me and I invite them to the house later. Becca and I will be going to my parents’ house immediately following this, and normally that would be enough peopling for me, but I think maybe I’ll need the easy camaraderie that we have with each other by then. Probably desperately so.

Poppy walks over to us and looks up at me. Becca is by her side because as soon as the service was over, she bolted for her.

“It was a beautiful service,” Poppy says.

“Thank you for coming.”

She nods and looks like she wants to say more, but instead, she turns and hugs Becca. They say something quietly and do a little handshake the two of them have started doing lately. It’s nothing too complicated, but it’s cute. Just another thing to endear me to Poppy…like I needed another thing.

When everyone leaves, I’m still there standing, feeling drained but unable to move. I don’t know why. I don’t have any final words to say. I haven’t been able to say anything,sitting next to him in the hospital room, and I can’t now. I think the opportunity died when he chose the bottle over his family. When he shook me until my teeth rattled. The first time he gave me a black eye.

Yeah, there’s nothing really left to say.

“Bowie.”

My mom’s voice pulls me from my thoughts. She stands a few feet away. Her hair is pulled back in a taut bun and she looks tired. Tobias lingers by the cars. I thought he’d left.

I straighten. “Hey.”

“I wanted to thank you,” she says. “For everything. It was a nice funeral.”

I nod. “It was.”

Her lips press into a thin line. “He wasn’t easy to love.”

“No, he wasn’t.” My voice sounds flat.

“But he was your father and now he’s gone.” She sighs, wrapping her arms around herself.

She says it so simply, like the past can just be buried along with the man. I bite back my frustration. Now isn’t the time to voice my bitterness.

“I’ve been thinking about what’s next. For me,” she says.

I nod slightly, waiting.

She turns to face me. “I’m moving in with you and Becca,” she says firmly.

It takes a second for those words to sink in. “What?” I say, startled.

“I can’t live alone. And I don’t want to go back to Austria. Not yet, anyway.”

“Mom, that’s…not exactly something we’ve talked about.”

“We’re talking now,” she says, pinning me with her stare. “I’ve already made arrangements to sell the house. It’s too big for me and it’s time for a change.”

I rub the back of my neck, trying to process this. She’s always been difficult in her own way—demanding, sharp-tongued, and unyielding—but as she said about my dad, she’s still my mother. I can’t exactly refuse her outright when my dad isn’t even in the ground yet.

“Becca’s got her routines, her space…it might be a tough adjustment for all of us.”

“I’m not expecting a palace, Bowie, although your place is a palace compared to mine.”

It’ll be too big for you too, I want to tell her.But too small for us with you there.

“I just need a place to stay while I figure things out. I want to be a better grandmother…to help you more than I have.”

I sigh, glancing at Tobias, who walks up and leans against a tree. I’m not sure how much of this he’s heard.

“Okay,” I say finally. “While you figure out what’s next.”

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