26. Derrick

CHAPTER 26

Derrick

It takes all my willpower not to follow Raleigh inside and up the stairs. At some point before this weekend ends, we’re going to have to confront each other, but now isn’t the time. What I want is for her to come to me of her own free will, to let me into her life because she wants me there.

But if I have to tie her down and talk some sense into her, I will.

Sure enough, I find my mother in the stables where Raleigh left her.

“Can I make you lunch?” I ask, grabbing her buckets of brushes and muggy water before she can bend down for them.

She pats my back and follows me out to the shed. “Absolutely, my love! I’ve been missing your grilled cheeses.”

I help her put away her tools, then head to the kitchen to start heating the pan while she cleans herself up. Raleigh’s words echo through my head as I lather butter over bread and start browning it on the stove.

What she wanted to hear .

It could’ve been a jab, but I don’t think Raleigh meant it that way. It was more of an acknowledgement that this place is supposed to be my mother’s haven, and sometimes, to keep the peace, lies have to be told.

Did my mother tell her something of the past? That seems unlikely. If anything, I learned how to lie from my mother, who told the best lies to herself.

Speaking of, my mother comes into the kitchen as I’m putting more buttered bread into a pan. She takes a seat on a squeaky stool at the island behind me, and I can feel her eyes on my back, but I don’t turn. I let her study me, her only child, and I hope she sees what I want her to.

That I’m healthy, that I’m successful, that I’m fulfilled.

“I like Raleigh,” my mother declares, and I almost drop a slice of cheese into the pan instead of onto the bread.

Raleigh ? Made a good impression ? On my mother ? For a moment I can’t even compute that. Loud, brazen, careless Raleigh managed to charm my quiet, peace-loving mom?

How ?

“O-oh?” I ask. “That’s… good.”

Then I remember that I called Raleigh my girlfriend yesterday, and the point of this whole trip was to have her meet my mother. I put more gaiety into my tone and try again.

“I’m glad you like her, mom. Not that I didn’t think you would, I just-”

“She’s important to you,” my mother supplies.

That makes me pause, and I almost burn my fingers putting more cheese on browning bread.

My first instinct is to deny it, but how can I? Every time Raleigh tries to leave, I practically beg her to stay. Every time I touch her, I lose my mind. When she smiles at my dogs, when she softens in my arms, when she looks me in the eyes and tells me her truths.

“Yes,” I say, almost more to myself than to my mother. “She is.”

It feels like an earth-shattering epiphany and the understatement of the century all at once. Raleigh’s more than important to me. She came into my life for the briefest, most traumatic shared experience I can imagine only months ago, but it was enough to implant dreams of her into my nights. She reappeared a couple days ago with nothing but mischief in mind, and already, I can’t imagine another day going by without her.

Not that any of that matters. The moment she’s not trapped with me in the country, Raleigh intends to disappear. And if I’m thinking rationally, I should let her. She’s a daughter of the mafia, and I’m the sheriff. That’s already a doomed combination, and a baby isn’t the glue that’s going to magically make it work.

I can’t tell my mother a word of that though. I can’t even tell her that she’s going to be a grandmother soon, which guts me. My lies have always ostensibly been for my mother’s benefit, but keeping that truth from her feels cruel to me.

“Derrick?”

I can hear the careful concern in my mother’s voice, and I flip the grilled cheese in front of me before responding. “Hm?”

“Is everything really all right?”

My career is stalled, a street gang leader has my name at the top of his hit list, and the mother of my child is determined to want nothing to do with me. Everything is the least alright it’s been in a long time.

“I guess I’m… not sure about the future,” I say. I used to think I could be, that I could plot out every year of my life, from poor and beaten child of a broken home, to U.S. senator making laws that prevent situations like mine from ever happening. But that’s not how life works. Interruptions are inevitable. And if I ignore the interruption that is Raleigh and the baby I could have with her, I might lose something that is quickly becoming far more precious to me than any promising career path.

And if I chase after her, I could lose everything, all of it, once and for all.

“Well…” My mother sighs, and it shakes just a little. I focus hard on the second grilled cheese, and not the tightening in my throat.

“You’ve done something so incredible, Derrick. Something a lot of people told you that you couldn’t do. I know how hard you’ve worked for it, and I’m so, so proud of you. I need you to know that. I think every day about how impressive my boy is.”

She pauses, choosing her words as carefully as I choose mine.

“But I just… I think it might be a little unfair. You did all of this because you wanted to fix his mistakes. Does that make it fulfilling for you ? Or are you still looking for the thing that you really want?”

I can’t turn around now, but the grilled cheeses are done. I set the pan on an unheated burner and plate up the sandwiches, taking my time as my thoughts spiral. Raleigh, lying next to me in my bed, handcuffs holding us together. The spark in her eyes when she fed Chance and Justice whipped cream. The dimple in her cheek when she sasses me. The gentle curve of her stomach where our baby grows inside her.

If I’m standing at a crossroads, and my choices are between Raleigh and my career… I know which way I want to go.

And maybe if I told my mother all of the doubts holding me back, she’d be able to help me sort them out.

Unfortunately, it’s been far too long since I was able to tell my mother the whole truth. I can’t start now.

I turn to face her with a wry smile on my face, and the expression is loose enough that my mother visibly relaxes. I slide her plate across the island toward her and sit down with mine.

“Maybe I am,” I say lightly. “But in the meantime, I’m right where I want to be.”