And the roads were still rough, despite the sunshine.
I was over this journey to get home. All I wanted to do was get there, get changed, make my speech, and then go home and stoke up a fire. I had a great deal of work ahead of me if this meeting went well, and I knew if I placed it into Mac’s hands, that was exactly what would happen. Mac was a shark when it came to meetings, and there were moments where even I found him to be a bit intimidating. He had this stare where if he squinted just right, it looked like black had taken over his eyes. It could shiver an entire room and coat their folders in frost, and I grinned with the memory as I thought about how helpless that board room would soon feel.
I’d sent my shark into a tank with a school of goldfish.
“What?” Abby asked.
“Nothing. Just work stuff.”
“Ah, I should’ve known,” she said. “Your favorite subject that you never talk about.”
“I told you a great deal about my work.”
“Grinch.”
“How does that make me a Grinch?” I asked.
“Because you aren’t supposed to think about work over the holidays.”
“I’m supposed to think about my cheating-ass father?” I said.
I heard Abby gasp before she whipped her gaze over to mine.
“What?” she asked.
“Nothing,” I said.
“Colin. What did you say?”
“Just drop it.”
“Your father had an affair?” she asked.
“I said drop it, Abby.”
I clenched my jaw and tried to calm the anger rising up my throat. She knew exactly the right buttons to press. She just had to harp on the fact that I was a workaholic and that I didn’t celebrate the holidays. She knew this was a temperamental button, and yet, she kept batting at it like an incessant little toddler. What in the world was wrong with this woman? Did she have a damn screw loose?
“Thank you,” she said.
“I believe the proper phrase is ‘I’m sorry,’” I said.
“I was thanking you for taking me home, and for everything else you’ve done,” she spat.
Now it was my turn to feel bad.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “You’re welcome.”
“Both proper phrases. Good for you.”
I stole a glance at her and could see the grin crawling across her cheeks. She was sassy. That was for sure. She had a mouth on her that could spit fire in a heartbeat. Even though she was annoying as hell, it was honestly a bit refreshing. People I worked with—except for Mac—seemed almost intimidated and put off by me. They told me exactly what I wanted to hear and always addressed me formally. People who recognized me and came up to me on the street were always offering a smile and hiding behind their plastered-on masks of joy and delight.
But Abby was always honest, no matter how she felt that honesty would affect someone at the time. It was nice, although very annoying.
“Really, though, thank you,” she said. “For paying for the hotel room and getting me that food. For just agreeing to take me home, even though I knew you didn’t want to.”
“Look, Abby. We’re two very different people. You’re spot on when you call me a Grinch. I’m the last person people want to spend holidays with. But I’m not a bad man. I do help people sometimes.”
“I didn’t mean to insinuate you didn’t,” she said.
“I mean, I was the one that found out my father was having an affair. Walked right in on him and another woman when I came home from lacrosse practice early.”
“My gosh. Colin, I’m so sorry.”
“I was so angry with him,” I said. “I accused him of ruining our family. You know that man actually tried to get me to keep his secret. Kept saying things like, ‘it’s just a bad spot,’ and ‘things’ll get better between your mother and I.’ It wasn’t until I grew up and looked back on the situation that I realized my father had been screwing around because Mom had become busier than he would’ve liked with her own job. Her own life.”
I could feel Abby’s eyes on me as my mouth ran away from my body. I had no idea why I was telling her all this. It was like I was having another out of body experience. It was me, but it didn’t feel like me.
Only this time, I wasn’t wishing for it to stop.
“I told my mother what I saw, knowing I was doing the right thing. And even though it cost them their marriage, I knew that woman deserved better. She tried for years to get me to talk to my father, but I wasn’t having it. I wanted nothing to do with that man. After everything my mother gave him: a home, a child, someone to clean up after him, support. She put her entire life on hold to raise a family with him and bounce around until he landed in a career he was happy with, and the one time she did something for herself, he went and fucking cheated. Like a coward.”
I felt my hands gripping the steering wheel tightly. I could feel my breath coming in pants. Even thinking about it made me irate. My mother, with her beautiful eyes and her thick head of hair she had even while she was in her sixties. That woman was the epitome of grace and elegance, and my father had thrown her away like trash.
Like she was no better than dog shit on the bottom of his shoe.
“Do you ever think you’ll talk with him?” Abby asked.
I instantly felt my body relax into the seat as the snow
