Page 84 of The Secret We Keep
“See.”
Slapping my arm, she then curls her fingers around her mug, gripping it tight. “I know something’s up.”
Exhaling a depleted breath, I tell her, “I’ll be fine. No need to worry about me.”
One of her hands comes out to land on my arm. It’s the same arm Morgan held onto when I dropped her home. I drove so carefully, absolutely fucking terrified of being behind the wheel with someone else in my car. It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be, but I still had to shake loose the memories from the night Aaron died.
“I always worry.”
My head turns to Mum. All I can do is smile at her. The familiar swell of shame beginning to swirl in my gut.
“Paddy, love, I know when you’re lying.”
My eyes bulge in surprise. “How? I’m never here to see you.”
“And for that,” she clips me around the back of the head, “I’ll never forgive you.”
I rub at the area, leaning away. “What’d you do that for?”
“Because I want you home more.”
“I thought you wanted me to succeed? I can’t do that here. That’s why I moved to London,” I gripe.
“There’s plenty for you to do here, and plenty of people who want you here, too.”
I eye her suspiciously. “You and Pops don’t count asplenty of people,” I mimic. “Seriously, I’m not lying.” I check my head for any serious damage. Even for a woman of her size, she packs a punch.
“I’ve had years of practice, son. Don’t be forgettin’ that I gave birth to you. Raised you with my bare hands with no help from anyone but your father. Believe you me, I know when you’re not telling me the truth.”
“Give me one example.”
She anchors her elbows on the table like a woman on a mission. “When you were fourteen and decided to draw a hundred-meter penis on the field using weedkiller during forest school and told me you had no clue what shape you were drawing. Or when you hacked the schoolinterweb system and changed your teacher’s profile picture to a nun riding a camel. Or when you decided to write your phone number asking for oral sex in the bus stop and blamed it on Fi?” She hums, raising a distrusting brow.
I blow out my cheeks, wishing I had some sort of defence. “The penis wasn’t a hundred-metres, Mum. It was eighty, to be precise. And Ididn’thack the schoolinternetsystem,” I draw out the word, correcting her. “Danny used my login and changed it.”
She widens her eyes even further. “So you’re not denying wanting the oral sex?”
For fuck’s sake. “What’s with the third-degree? ThatwasFi and her little friends, thinking they were funny. I didn’t want oral sex back then.”
“Christ, is that why you drew the giant penis in the field?” She tries to hold it back, but a laugh roars out of her.
An involuntary smile breaks on my face. “You think that’s so funny?”
“Well, I didn’t at the time, no.” She wipes under her eye. “I don’t know how many times I had to talk your father out of sending you to military school for that.”
I smile again, this time of my own accord. “I wish he had.”
She looks up at me. “Why?”
I shrug, knowing I’m about to tell her what’s eating away at me. “If I’d been there, I wouldn’t have ended up losing everything, would I?”
Mum sighs, taking a sip of her tea. “Then I’d never see you.” She sips her tea again. “What is it that you think you lost?”
“My home. My girlfriend. Maybe my job.” There’s no way to sugarcoat it.
I watch Mum process what I just said. “I want you to know,thiswill always be your home.” She taps her finger on the table. “I may haveonly seen it once, but that flat, however nice, wasn’t ever going to be your forever. And I don’t know that you’re really missing that girl you had, son. From what Fi told me, she was a royal you know what.”
Listening to her, something cracks open inside me. “You spoke to Fi?” Proof that they care has guilt rising like a wave in my throat, forcing it to burn. I should have been here more.
