Page 32 of A Place Like You

“Why do you say it like that?” I inquire.

“Mom,” he answers. “It’s complicated to date when there’s a kid involved.”

I nod, playing along, even though I’m clueless about the complications. Pretending to grasp the depth of his insight, when in reality, I have no fucking idea what he’s talking about. I was the son of a single father, and he had no trouble dating. Dad made it look pretty easy.

“According to my mother, it’s an art to date a single parent,” he answers, apparently filling the void of my unspoken question.

Clearly, I’m not familiar with that concept. In my experience, it was straightforward— you tell your child, “This is my new wife,” and you keep your distance. That’s what my father did with me.

“How so?” I ask, not because I have any intention of dating Wren, but because I’m genuinely curious.

“You have to be aware that she’s a package deal—a mom and a son. It’s not just her,” he explains, his words painting a picture of a family dynamic I can barely comprehend. “He’s going to be a permanent presence and become part of your family. From the moment you ask her out, you acknowledge that he’s your potential stepson and not just some random person who might be around.”

I can’t help but chuckle at the irony.

“What’s so funny?” Cal asks, puzzled by my unexpected reaction.

“Every woman who married or dated our father treated me like I was some stranger invading their space as if I didn’t belong,” I say with a bitter undertone that I can’t suppress. I can’t deny the emotional scars I have from being excluded from his life.

“That’s fucked up,” he mumbles, his steps faltering.

It truly was. My father never took me along on vacation, never considered me part of the family, not then, not in the subsequent ones either. I’ve always been the one left behind, an afterthought in his life.

“I wasn’t part of his first family, the next, or . . . you get the idea,” I continue, my emotions bubbling to the surface, like a dormant volcano waiting to erupt.

Cal shakes his head in disbelief, struggling to comprehend the extent of my isolation. “And to think that we envied you.”

“Me?” I laugh incredulously, continuing our walk toward the ranch. “Why would you?”

“No matter what happened, you were always with him,” Cal says, his voice tinged with envy. “Magnus, Bach, and I wanted to be you. Unlike us, you were a permanent fixture in his life. We stopped being his children once he divorced our mother and only saw him a few times a year.”

I can tell him that at least he had Donna, his mother, but I stay silent. There’s no point in telling him that he had it a million times better than I did.

“He was stuck with me. I was a punishment for knocking up the help,” I tell him, unaware of how much he knows about my origins, but wanting to give him the real picture. “Our grandparents made him drag me around. It wasn’t because he loved me more than the rest of you.”

“Where’s your mother?” he asks, not asking more questions about our father and our fucked-up relationship.

“Who knows? Someone probably paid her off so she’d disappear,” I reply, trying to sound casual while masking the anger that still simmers within me.

“We could try to dig around so we can figure it out,” he offers, genuinely wanting to help solve the mystery of my past. But what’s there to fix?

“I already tried and didn’t find anything,” I answer, almost disappointed. Not because I long for a mother, but because she holds the answers I’ve sought for years.

“So, you weren’t his favorite, huh?” Cal probes, trying to make sense of my relationship with our father.

“I was nobody to Eric,” I admit, bitterness seeping into my words as I recall the indifference he showed me throughout my life. I was an invisible presence in his world, always there but never truly seen.

“Well, then I’m sure that if you decide to pursue something with the doctor, you’ll know how important it is to include her son,” Cal says, his words pulling me back from the memories of my father’s neglect. And I’m thankful that he doesn’t circle back to Eric’s fucked-up behavior.

“I wouldn’t date her,” I establish, trying to convince myself more than anyone else. The truth is, I’m torn between the desire to be with Wren and the realization that it wouldn’t be fair to anyone.

My future lies back in Los Angeles, where I’ll have to decide on a new career path. I’ll probably open a new practice and build a life there. They’ll stay in this little town, living their best life. Despite everything, I can’t help but feel for Milo, whose father chose to stay away, missing out on the best part of himself—his own son.

You were no different, I remind myself. I chose work, and that’s why I lost it all.

“Can you have CQS go through the remains of my house and see if they can find anything that’s useful?” I ask, because losing the remnants of my past is too fucking painful.

Cal glances at me, narrowing his gaze. “Like what? Electronics, clothes, your favorite scalpel? They’re probably lost.”

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