She looks at me steadily. “You’ve been gone for over a month, haven’t returned a single message or phone call, and that’s the first thing you say to me?”
“What did you expect?”
“Oh, I don’t know. How about an apology?”
I smile at that. It’s so…Yvonne.
“I understand congratulations are in order,” I say wryly. “You’re getting married.”
She smirks a little, and I know full well that this was her intention all along. She sent out those wedding invitations to get my attention. To trap me, secure in the knowledge that I’m my father’s son and won’t stoop to such scandal.
She’s wrong.
I’m my mother’s son, first and foremost.
I can’t erase my past growing up in a trailer park with hand-me-down clothes and good honest work, and I’m done pretending that I want to.
“Apparently I wasn’t clear last time,” I say, my voice impressively calm. “I’m not marrying you.”
She presses her lips together before gesturing toward her living room. “Let’s sit down and talk about this. I’ll make you a drink.”
I resist the urge to rub my temples. “I don’t want to talk. I don’t want a drink. I want you to let everyone know that there’s not going to be a wedding.”
“How am I supposed to do that? The invitations were fifty dollars apiece and have already gone out.”
“Fifty fucking bucks for a piece of paper? What are they, lined in gold?”
She stares at me, and I swear softly. They really were lined in gold.
“I don’t know, Yvonne. Figure it out.”
I reach for the doorknob, and for the first time her eyes widen in panic, as though just now realizing that she might not get her way.
“Preston, what is going on with you? I said I was sorry about the affair.”
“I’m not,” I say quietly. “If it wasn’t now, it’d be later that we ended things. We’re not good for each other.”
“That’s ridiculous. We’re the same. Or at least we will be once you get over this weird rebellious stage of yours.”
I can’t help laughing. Unbelievable.
She sweeps a hand toward me. “Sure it is. You’ve lost both parents in the past few years, and you’re on the verge of a big life change by getting married. You’re acting out.”
“Rebellious stage? Acting out?” I repeat. “I’m not sixteen, and you’re not my mother.”
She sneers. “Thank God for that.”
I go very still. “What did you just say?”
Yvonne goes slightly pale, as though realizing she’s gone too far. It’s no secret that she couldn’t stand my mother, but at least since Mom’s death she’s had the decency to hold her tongue.
“She was never anything but kind to you,” I say, my voice vibrating with anger.
She steps closer, reaching out a hand, and I reel back. “Preston…”
“Noah,” I snap.
She swallows. “Noah.” The word sounds like she’s choking on it, but she must be more panicked than I realize, because she once told me she’d have nothing to do with “that part of my life.” Another signal that I fucked up by ever thinking Yvonne was marriage material.