The 'Burg: Hold On Part 57

The essence of hotness: a bada.s.s capable of uttering the word "gooey," doing that s.h.i.t and making my c.l.i.t tingle.

I wasted no time either.

Merry met me halfway probably with a dual purpose, the second part of that being we were not in the door where Ethan could see when Merry took me in his arms, bent and laid a wet one on me.

When he was done I was wishing we had all kinds of time to be gooey.

Since we didn't, I warned, "Don't let Mom steal you away with her tater tot ca.s.serole. Just so you know, I have the recipe."

Merry held me close in his arms and smiled at me.

My kid. My guy. My mom. Her tater tot ca.s.serole. And Merry smiling at me.

There it was again.

f.u.c.king happy.

"This is delicious, Grace," Merry told my mother.

We were sitting at Mom's kitchen table.

Ethan was shoveling his gramma's food in his mouth like he'd been told he was getting nothing but C rations for the next year after that meal.

I was freaking.

This was because somewhere between leaving my house and sitting at Mom's table, something had happened to Merry.

Something extreme.

Gone was the mellow, funny guy he gave my kid. Gone was the thoughtful, gentlemanly guy he gave my mom. And gone was the teasing, hot guy he gave me.

He was quiet to the point he was distant, like he was there but he didn't want to be.

Worse, he wasn't hiding that.

At all.

Those four words were the first he'd spoken since conversation had awkwardly died when both mom and me sensed Merry retreating.

"Thank you, Garrett," Mom replied. "I'm glad you like it."

He nodded to her once, didn't further engage, just turned back to eating.

My heart sank to my stomach.

That was so not Merry.

Mom looked at me and I instantly saw that her enthusiasm at having a new addition to her family dinner, this being a good guy who was into her daughter, had died.

She wasn't freaking like me.

She was disappointed.

Then again, she didn't go all out for dinner, cleaning her house, even putting out flowers Merry would most definitely see and know that was an outlay Mom didn't splurge on often (her doing it to show Merry he was making the right choice of possibly wanting to be a part of this family) to have him act like the last place he wanted to be was there.

I had nothing for my mom, nonverbally and definitely not verbally, to explain what was going on with Merry.

What I wanted was to kick him in the shin, this my way of telling him to snap out of it at the same time asking him what the f.u.c.k was his problem.

That was the Cher way of dealing with things.

But after nearly blowing it with Merry, I needed to learn not to do s.h.i.t like that. I couldn't react, mouth off, or do something stupid and then face the consequences later. Not without risking f.u.c.king us up, and I'd promised myself I wouldn't do that.

But this wasn't Merry. Not even a little bit. I'd never seen him like this. Even when Tanner and Rocky were on the b.u.mpy path of their reunion, something neither Merry nor his dad hid was just as b.u.mpy for them, he didn't get like this. Not when he had a s.h.i.tty case he was investigating that took time and effort that, in the end if he closed it, only allowed him to give a small measure of relief to the people who'd had their lives irrevocably altered when the s.h.i.t of life buried them under the stink.

"I hear you have a boat," Mom noted, attempting to snap Merry out of it by engaging him in conversation.

"Yep," he told his plate.

He said no more.

Well, that didn't work.

"You got a boat?" Ethan piped up excitedly.

That got him. Merry looked to my son, the blankness leaving his face, and it softened.

"I do, bud," he said quietly. "But, just to say, it's for sale."

I stared at him because I had no clue he was selling his boat. I'd actually never been officially informed he had a boat.

I didn't do healthy relationships until now (arguably, especially at this moment), but that seemed like something to share, say, when he was hanging at J&J's having a drink. Or perhaps when we were making out on my couch and feeling each other up last night after Ethan went to sleep. Or during dinner at Sw.a.n.k's, waffles at my place, lunches (plural) at Frank's, or in one of what I was now seeing were the not-very-informative texts he'd sent me.

"Why are you selling it?" Mom asked.

Merry looked to her. "In the market to get a house. Got a realtor; she sent some listings. Looked through eighteen of 'em. Didn't like what I saw except for two, both outside my price range. To make 'em in my price range, I gotta liquidate some things for the down payment."

I kept staring at him, because selling your boat might not be something that you'd share with the woman in your life but buying a house definitely was.

I wanted to be smart. Not get ticked or more freaked but instead twist that to something happy.

First, Merry out of that c.r.a.ppy apartment. Second, the idea he was doing that now, after he'd decided to take a shot at an us with me.

But the way he gave Mom that information, void of emotion, didn't sit well with me.

Mom didn't care about the void-of-emotion part.

She went straight to the twisting.

"You're in the market for a house?" Her voice was an octave higher, filled with hope and excitement.

"Yeah, Grace. Don't live in a great place. Time to move on," Merry answered, no inflection in his tone at all.

Mom gave happy eyes to me.

Ethan declared, "A boat is better than a house."

"You don't have my view, buddy," Merry replied.

"View is always better from a boat," Ethan informed him.

Finally, one side of Merry's lips curled up. "Can't argue that."

"Have more corn, Garrett," Mom urged, seeing his plate almost clean and picking up the bowl of corn.

"Prefer seconds of that ca.s.serole, Grace," he returned.

She dropped the corn so fast it clattered and nabbed the ca.s.serole.

With Merry reengaged (sort of), the rest of dinner and dessert went okay.

Not great.

Just okay.

And okay was so...not...Merry.

After we were done, Mom shooed the boys out so the women could do the dishes, something she'd normally never do because she wasn't about "women's work" unless that work involved pushing out babies, which was only women's work due to biology.

Which meant she wanted to be alone with me to hash out what was going on with Merry.

The guys. .h.i.t the living room and I hit the sink, wanting to hash out what was going on with Merry too. The problem with that was, in this scenario, it was me who had to provide the information and I had no clue.

Mom got close with the meatloaf platter and a Tupperware container.

"Garrett's being strange. Are you two okay?" she asked under her breath, seeing as her house was nearly as tiny as mine and they were in the next room.

I thought we were.

For the life of me, I couldn't imagine the way Merry was at dinner had one thing to do with him and me.

I just couldn't think of what it did have to do with.

"Yeah," I told her.

"He wasn't him..." She paused. "At all."

"Yeah," I repeated.

"Except with Ethan," she revised.

At least there was that.

"You need to talk to him, honey-sicle," she advised.

I looked from filling the sink with soapy water, to my mom.

"Maybe I should let this slide," I suggested.

Her face started to go mom-like, so I rushed on.

"We're new, Mom. Still feelin' each other out. It's only been a week since our first date. Not your fault, I was all for it, but maybe dinner at the mom's house was too soon."

This was a possible option of what was going on with Merry.

But even as it came out of my mouth, I didn't buy it.

"He's sat at that table before, Cheryl," she reminded me, swinging her hand to the kitchen table. "I fed him and Mike when they helped out with my house, and I fed him lunch when he was takin' care of my walls. He filled his plate with food from that table when I had Ethan's ninth birthday party. Stuffed his face from that table at last year's Christmas party. He is not a stranger to this house. He's not a stranger to me or Ethan. But he was a stranger tonight."

She was right.

I looked back to the water filling the sink and turned it off. I was shifting to go to the table to grab plates, but I stopped when Mom's hand caught my forearm.

I gave her my eyes.

"Whole town's watchin', you know that," she said quietly. "Whole town's waitin' to see what comes of you and Garrett Merrick. Figure most of 'em are rootin' for you two. Same's I figure most of 'em think you're gonna go down in flames, that bein' you who ignites that blaze or, due to history in this scenario, more likely it bein' him."

Her hand left me, but she didn't quit talking.

"I know my girl. I know you want everyone to think you don't care what they think. But I also know you care about that man in there."

She jerked her head toward the wall on the other side of which was her living room.

She then kept going.

"It is no secret Tanner Layne had his hands full beatin' back the demons that plagued the woman he loved, demons that drove her away from the only man for her and she knew he was just that. She still let those demons win, sugar. Story told so often in this town, I know. Everyone knows. And what we know is Tanner made one mistake in all that. In the beginning, he gave up. But Raquel put up a h.e.l.l of a fight to make him quit and they were young so neither of 'em knew better. You and Garrett are not at that place."

I opened my mouth to tell her she wasn't wrong, and more (something I had to chew on), Mia's fatal mistake was giving up too.

But Mom wasn't done speaking.

"Like I said, I know my girl. So I know my girl's a fighter. Now, don't you make the mistake of doin' somethin' you're tellin' yourself is right, givin' him s.p.a.ce and time to sort his own self out, when you know it's wrong. Garrett Merrick didn't sit at my table tonight, honey. And you need not to waste any time findin' out what took him away from that table, which meant he took himself away from you."

"There's a lot goin' on that you don't know, Mom," I shared.

I shared it and it was lame.