“Will you let me finish?” my mom asked in exasperation.
“Okay, okay.” I held up my hands in surrender.
“He wants me to move in with him,” she said carefully, her attention focused on the mug in her hands.
“Oh. Uh…” I’d not been expecting that, and, as with other moments in my life where my next words would be essential…my mind was blank. “Shouldn’t you, uh, at least be engaged first so that he…”
She looked up at me, amused. “So he’s not taking advantage?”
My face burned. “Well, uh…yeah.”
She set her mug down and patted my shoulder with a laugh. “Thank you. I love you, too.”
As always, my mom seemed to understand where I was coming from even when I couldn’t quite get the words right. I guess that’s what made her my mom.
“And if Sam had his way,” she said, “that’s exactly the way it would be.”
I tilted my head to one side, trying to follow what she was saying. “You mean he asked you to marry him?” I demanded. If so, this was the first I’d heard of it.
“Not so loud,” she reminded me with a frown. “And yes. Several times.”
I sat back in my chair, my words gone again. “And you said…”
She took a breath and let it out slowly, studying the mug in front of her. “It’s complicated. I’m not sure I’m ready for that.”
“So, he’s suggesting moving in as an alternative,” I said, finally getting it. “He’s trying to work up to the getting-married part.”
“He didn’t exactly position it that way,” she said wryly. “But I suspect that’s his goal, yes.”
It took a second to imagine Sam with a place at our table here, a chair that would be his. Unless…maybe it wouldn’t be him at our table, but us at his.
My stomach dropped a little at the thought. Moving into Sam’s place? I couldn’t picture it. I’d never even been there. It was an old fix-it-up farmhouse on the edge of town; I knew that much. Old and isolated; that could either be really good…or really bad for me.
Then a second thought struck, just as hard as the first. Maybe they weren’t planning on my tagging along.
I was starting classes at Richmond Community College in a couple of weeks. Apartments were available near campus, but living so close to that many people—and the ghosts following them around—without a spirit guide seemed like a bad idea. At least my mom knew what was going on when she saw me seemingly talking to open air. Not that I wanted to live with her for the rest of my life, but it was going to take a little more time to figure out a workable solution, now that Alona was…unavailable.
I glanced involuntarily toward my bedroom. The temperature drop my mom had referenced likely meant a spectral visitor, or ten. I could hear vague whispers coming from the hall as they talked among themselves. At least they knew enough to know I wouldn’t like finding them here and were trying to be discreet. Without a spirit guide to keep them in line, they’d been breaking all kinds of rules lately, like coming to my house and waiting for me in my freaking bedroom.
But I’d find a way to deal with it, if I had to. I wasn’t going to hold my mom prisoner with my problems. She’d already been through that enough.
I cleared my throat. “So, uh, whose house?” I asked. “I mean, are you going there, or is he coming here? And when is—”
She shook her head. “I’m going to tell him no.”
“Because you’re not ready or…”
She avoided my gaze.
I sighed. “Because of me.”
“You’re my son,” she said fiercely, looking up at me. “And we take care of each other.”
I nodded, recognizing the words as similar to those she’d said in the hours following my father’s funeral. It had been only the two of us for years now.
She straightened up. “Besides, you need me right now with Alona off flitting around somewhere, paying no attention to her duties.” Her mouth tightened in disapproval.
I grimaced at the lie I’d given her to explain Alona’s absence and the increase in ghost activity around me. I couldn’t tell her that Alona was directly responsible for Lily’s amazing “recovery.” My mom had handled the ghost-talker thing fairly well, but Alona’s spirit in Lily’s body? That was beyond even her most liberal thinking. And she’d never particularly liked Alona to begin with, so I didn’t want to make things worse.
“Mom, as much as I appreciate that, there’s nothing you can do,” I pointed out, trying to be as careful as I could not to hurt her feelings. “This is something I have to work out on my own.”
“I know that,” she said, with exaggerated patience. “I’m certainly not capable of helping you resolve any of your”—she eyed the basement door, which was open a crack, checking to see that Sam hadn’t returned—“issues.” She reached out and took my hand, squeezing it. “But I can at least make sure you have a safe place to be yourself until you figure it out.”
I shook my head, feeling the sting of tears in my eyes and nose. “You shouldn’t have to give up your life, not any more than you already have.”
She waved my words away. “Who says I’m giving up anything?” She stood and took her mug to the sink. “That farmhouse of his is a wreck still, especially the kitchen. And in six months or a year”—she shrugged—“his renovations will be done and maybe you’ll be ready to be on your own. It’s not the end of the world.”
But I could hear the forced note of cheeriness in her voice. Sam had already proposed multiple times, and moving in together was less than what he wanted. How long would he be willing to wait for that? Especially without knowing the truth about what was going on with me.
My mom had decided that she didn’t want Sam to feel forced into believing something that most people found pretty far out there. Okay, fine, but without that context, he might think she’d never come around. That we were like those permanently messed-up, codependent mothers and sons. Norman Bates and his mom, or whatever.
“Do me a favor,” I said.
She turned away from the sink and raised an eyebrow at me, her hands already covered in bubbles from scrubbing the tea mug. She always cleans when she’s upset, especially when she’s not admitting that she’s upset. “What’s that?” she asked, obviously suspicious that I was going to try to talk her into something.
“Just…don’t say no yet.”
She opened her mouth, but I kept going before she could speak. “Give me a couple more weeks. Tell him you need time to think about it, if you have to, but don’t tell him no. Please.”
“Nothing is going to change that quickly.” She looked tired suddenly. “I don’t want to give him false hope.”
“I’m working on something, okay? I just need a little more time.” If I couldn’t at least find a lead by then, it probably wasn’t going to happen any time soon. In which case, contingency plans would need to be made. And living at home forever was not one of them.
My mom narrowed her eyes at me. “William, if you’re putting yourself in danger—”
“Totally safe, promise.” Which was true…to an extent. Leaving things as they were would be far more dangerous—that much was certain.
She nodded slowly, not quite sure whether to believe me. “All right.”
“Thanks.” I stood, shoved my chair in, and, before leaving the kitchen, took the extra couple of steps to kiss her cheek, startling her. “I got this. Don’t worry,” I said, wishing I felt as certain as I sounded.
But first things first. Before I could continue working on a way to get Alona back in spirit form—and consequently, giving my mom her life back—I had to address a more immediate problem. I left my mom at the sink, with the sound of Sam’s footsteps coming up the basement stairs, to head back to my bedroom.