His mother was empty.
My mother had known him mere months, and she flew our entire family to Dallas, the boys leaving school, planning things that would take Judge’s mind off his loss.
And his mother had given him nothing.
But this pain.
Judge kept going.
“You told me she was something in high school. But she lived her glory days then, being pretty and dating the local rich man’s tall, handsome, ambitious son and that was all there was to her. And she knew it. She never reached for more, worked for more, hoped for more, dreamed about more, wanted more. And because she knew it, because she knew there was nothing to her, she couldn’t hack it. She had to bury it, live in an alternate reality where she couldn’t think or feel. Or make up devils she had to fight who did her wrong. She knew you were destined for greatness, and she couldn’t just know this about herself, and simply stand at your side, love you, support you, make a family with you and take care of that family, all of which is something beautiful. Something real. But in the end, it’s something. Instead, she hated you for being what she fell in love with in the first place. And she hated you because you reminded her that her peak was senior year and then her life was over.”
He took a huge breath and finished it.
“And I didn’t factor at all.”
It took Jamie a second, but he finally said, “I wish I could argue, say you’re wrong, but my greatest fear has always been that you’re right. Everything you just said is right.”
“You know what her greatest fear was, Dad?”
“What was it, Judge?”
“That I’d spend time with you, and I’d know it too. The same with Granddad. They worked in tandem to keep me from you because they knew, if I spent time with you, I’d know exactly what those two wastes of flesh were. And my reason for being would be getting to you. She tried to turn me against you. She’d lie about you. And Granddad is not dumb. He saw early what I was like, and what I liked. He’d come and get me and take me out on a horse and tell me it all was going to be mine, and how I should thank my lucky stars I wasn’t growing up choked by concrete and steel.”
Jamie made no reply, but the room was seething with emotion, heavy and dark, and Judge sharing that didn’t alleviate any of it.
“So Tom is right. And Duncan is right,” Judge continued. “He’s a piece of shit, a joke, playing games, striking out when he has to know on some level we are both dealing with some serious fucked-up shit. Talking trash, when anyone who’d listen to him isn’t worth knowing, and everyone else gets that he’s an old man desperate to stay relevant.”
He paused, and I was behind him, but I could still hear the ragged breath he pulled in.
And then he finished.
“As for Mom, she’s dead, and she didn’t care about much when she was alive, including me, so why should I give a fuck anyone knows that?”
When he was done, no one said anything, and no one moved.
It was Dru who broke the tense, heartbreaking silence.
“I don’t know if it’s the right thing to say, if it’ll help. But you should know that my mom thought the world of you, Judge. She loved you. She loved you loads.”
I turned my head and pressed my forehead in Judge’s back as I felt the tremor go through his body at hearing those words.
“It means everything, doll,” he said hoarsely.
And then I was sharing a Hug Judge Moment as I felt Dru’s hands clasping my waist because she was hugging him from the front.
Yes, it was official.
I loved that girl.
“See, Dad? A movement and I’m surrounded by love,” Judge groaned.
And that was when I was forced to shift around his body, gently press Dru away and go down to the floor with my man as he folded.
He ended on his ass, cross legged. I ended in his lap with his face pressed into the side of my neck, holding him around his head and shoulders and rocking him as his anger and sadness wet my skin.
“It’s fucked up to cry for her,” he grumbled against my flesh.
“No, it isn’t, honey. It’s perfectly natural,” I cooed.
“She didn’t earn this.”
“What’s coming out right now is not for what you lost, but what you never had.”
“Fuck,” he grunted, and I took this to mean he was overwhelmed by my wisdom.
Therefore, it was a moral imperative to remind him, “As you know, I’m always right.”
This time, Judge did a laugh-cry, pulling away from my neck and looking at me.
He then blinked.
“Jesus, what happened to your face?” he asked.