For the first time in a while, I pull into the grocery store parking lot. I’m making Lauren dinner tonight. I just don’t know what to make. I text Colin as I walk into the supermarket.
What’s your sister’s favorite food?
I should know this. She’s the mother of my child, for fuck’s sake. It takes until I’m pushing a cart down an aisle of vegetables to get a reply from Colin.
Which sister?
I roll my eyes at the screen. He’s being an ass on purpose.
The one I slept with. So your guess is as good as mine.
He responds right away.Not cool, dude. It’s bad enough you actually did sleep with one. Lauren likes cheese.
What can you make with cheese? Grilled cheese? I’d hope for something a bit … more … for tonight though. Fuck. I rarely got home cooked meals. Actually, ninety percent of any home-cooked, legit healthy meal I ate came from the Winters’ house. No wonder Lauren is a good cook. She grew up like that.
And I want our kid to grow up like that too. Family dinners, all seated together and eating something that didn’t come from a paper bag. My own mother was a fan of fast food, and then “fend for yourself” once I got old enough to drive.
It’s not like she was a horrible mother, just an absent one. She took it hard when my dad left. She had to pick up the pieces of life, deal with the hell I raised, and still work to provide for us. She worked the evening shift as a nurse at a nursing home, and was gone by the time I got home from school and asleep when I left in the morning.
My mother was a hard worker—still is—but she put work first. I think it was her way of dealing with the divorce, of dealing with being cheated on and left with a child she didn’t know how to raise.
But it was her dedication to work over me that caused me to drift away, and caused things to be awkward between us. She didn’t want to be around me. I look like my father, after all. It hurt as a kid, but I’m over it now. She didn’t try, and I sure as hell didn’t either.
And it’s not like I hate my mother. We’re just not close. We talk on the phone on the important holidays. Once I graduated high school, she moved an hour away, saying she needed a fresh start. She never got over the divorce. Her untreated depression was almost contagious, and being around her brought me down, which is why I haven’t told her she’s going to be a grandma yet.
I know I need to. Even Lauren has been pestering me to. Ah, fuck. No better time as the present, right?
I pull up her number and press “call.” Then I wonder if this is a good thing to talk about at the grocery store. Meh, I never did give a fuck about anyone else’s opinion.
“Hey, Mom,” I say when she answers.
“Noah. Is everything all right?”
“It is.” I can’t blame her. I never call. “I got some exciting news. You’re going to be a grandma.”
There’s a minute of stunned silence. “You got a girl pregnant?”
“My girlfriend,” I say so it sounds like this wasn’t just some random hookup. It started that way, but it’s not ending that way.
“It was only a matter of time,” she replies. “I’m honestly surprised it didn’t happen sooner.”
I close my eyes in a long blink, trying to stay calm. “You, uh, might remember her. It’s Colin’s sister, Lauren.”
“Your friend Colin? You’re dating his sister? And he’s okay with that?”
“Uh, kind of.”
“How far along is she? Is everything going okay? Are you two living together? You were single at Christmas.”
“She’s four months, everything is fine, and we’re not living together yet.”
“This wasn’t planned, was it? Not that there’s anything wrong with that.”
“No, it wasn’t. We’re working it out though. She’s excited.”
“What about her family? I remember them being a bit uptight.”
Strange how I take almost immediate offense to that. “It was a surprise for everyone. But now they’re happy. Excited for a baby due around the holidays.” I grab random produce and toss it in the cart. I make my way down the aisles, grabbing things that look good but having no idea what I can actually make with half these ingredients.