“It’s good to see your dad now while you have the chance, though,” she said.
“Tell Junior that.”
Melanie led the way into the kitchen, and she grabbed a pair of tongs from a drawer and put them on top of the salad. She had the table set already—the same dishes and cutlery that they’d brought here a decade ago—the cast-offs from their regular home. They’d do for now.
“What was the problem between you and Junior?” Melanie asked. “I mean, looking back on it as an adult... What went wrong?”
Logan was silent for a moment. “I was jealous, and he was insecure. I think it’s as simple as that. My father met my mom, had a short but passionate romance that resulted in me and they split up. Harry met Dot a couple of years later, got married and they started their own family. Dot and my mom—they never got along. Dot was motherly, sweet, kind, but my mom had the allure, you know? She was smart, feisty and drop-dead gorgeous. So there was always a bit of insecurity for Dot, I think. She had Harry’s heart, but Mom...you remember her.”
Melanie nodded. “She aged like a movie star.”
Logan seemed to have taken after his mother in that respect—chiseled and fit.
“And Mom enjoyed it a bit,” he said with a shrug. “Anyway, Harry had to make his wife happy, and after having been married, I understand that. But keeping Dot happy meant prioritizing her and their children over us.”
Maybe Mel was more like Dot than she wanted to think, trying to do everything she could to hold her family together. At least Dot had seen the danger, because Melanie hadn’t. She’d figured she could trust Adam and that checking up on him was vulgar. She still thought it was. If a man had to be chased down and supervised in order to stay faithful, then he wasn’t worth having.
“Did Dot think he’d cheat on her?” Melanie asked, her voice low.
“I don’t know...maybe.” He met her gaze and winced. “I’m sorry, Mel. I didn’t mean to sound that casual about infidelity. I know you’ve been through hell with your marriage, and—”
“Maybe I identify with Dot,” she said with a faint smile. “The motherly one.”
“From where I’m standing, motherly isn’t exactly what I’d call you,” he said, a smile tickling his lips.
She blushed at that. “I wasn’t fishing for compliments.”
“You don’t need to. You’re stunning. I get that you probably need some time to get your feet under you again before you can see that, but you aren’t exactly some matronly woman on the sidelines.”
That was what Adam had used her for—taking care of his kids while he did whatever he wanted behind her back.
“We aren’t supposed to be talking about me,” she said. “Your dad wasn’t fair to you. You were just as much his child—regardless of who your mom was.”
“Yeah, I agree,” he replied. “Which is why I was jealous. I got the crumbs off their table, and I knew it.”
“Did Junior know it?” she asked.
“How could he not? But Junior was insecure, too. He had our father’s love and support, but he always seemed to see me as a threat. I don’t know why. He got a whole lot more from Harry than I ever did.”
Melanie remembered that. When Logan had been in his senior year, he’d been trying to figure out how to afford college, applying for scholarships, looking for bursaries, anything, really. He’d been smart and he’d gotten a few different scholarships, and those combined with money he’d earned and his mom had saved had been enough to get him started. But she could still remember that forlorn look on his face when he got back from asking his dad if he’d pitch in.
The answer had been no. And she’d recognized then that this wasn’t just about money—Harry’s no had been to more than cash.
“But now you and Junior are both fathers,” she said. “It should be different between you, shouldn’t it?”
“Having a son of my own only shows me how little my dad cared for me from the start,” Logan said. “You know my biggest fear? Losing my relationship with my son. It would crush me. My dad didn’t care about that with me.”
But he had cared about that relationship with Junior—that was between the lines.
“Maybe having kids of his own has given Junior a bit of perspective into what it must have been like for you,” she said.
Logan shrugged. “I’m not going to hold my breath. Most people don’t change that much.”
Mel looked toward the table...she’d set three places. She had her own complicated relationship with her stepdaughter. Would Tilly be messed up by all of this? Would she end up being a forty-year-old telling someone the story of her disinterested father and the stepmom who failed her?
“I’ll see if Tilly wants to eat with us,” Melanie said. “I hope you don’t mind.”
“Of course,” Logan said. “She needs to eat, too.”
Melanie shot him a grateful smile. As she headed toward the bedrooms, she heard a sound coming from the bathroom—vomiting. Melanie winced, then came to the bathroom door. She tapped on it and leaned against the jamb.
“Tilly?” she repeated. “You okay in there?”
Tilly vomited again, then there was a flush. Was she sick, or was this the beginning of an eating disorder? Melanie was worrying like a mom again.
The door opened and Melanie stepped back. Tilly looked pale and haggard. The smell of sick lingered around her.
“Do you have the flu?” Melanie asked.
“I need to lie down,” Tilly said. “My stomach is upset.”
Melanie reached out and touched her forehead, checking for a fever. It was instinctive—the need to check the body temperature. Tilly pulled away.
“Leave me alone.” Tilly teetered toward her bedroom.
There had been no fever. It was possible she had a stomach bug, but it was also possible that Tilly was exercising control over
