Almost two years had passed since Kelsey had seen her mother. Her thin face was as haggard as ever, her eyes just as weary. As always, the aura of a much more beautiful woman surrounded her, but it had faded more and more as the years passed.

When she met Kelsey's glare of displeasure, she turned to Brett instead. She extended her hand and gave him a tremulous smile. "Hi. I'm Carlene Morrison. Kelsey's mother."

Brett took her hand, returning her smile. "Brett Hollister."

"Do you live in this building, too?" she asked.

"Yes. Right across from Kelsey. She moved in first, and then I—"

"Don't," Kelsey snapped.

Brett turned around, looking surprised, at the same time her mother's smile faded.

"What are you doing here?" Kelsey said.

Her mother's gaze shifted down the hall, then back to Kelsey. "I came by your apartment and you weren't home, so I waited."

"You actually thought I would want to see you?"

"No, I didn't," she said with a weak shrug. "All I could do was hope."

Kelsey felt a slow burn of anger that set every nerve on edge. Just being around her mother made her feel as if no time had passed, as if all the old memories were stepping up to slap her in the face one more time.

Her mother clutched her purse against her side, her shoulders hunched with uncertainty. "I left you a message several days ago. Did you get it?"

"I got it.”

"You never called back."

"That should tell you something. But for some reason, it never does."

"I just want you to listen to me," her mother said. "For just a few minutes."

No. Kelsey couldn’t do this. She had to get out of there before she got sucked in again, before she started to believe all her mother’s promises, which always turned out to be lies. And worst of all, this time the awful scene was playing out in front of Brett. How was it her mother always knew the precise time to show up when it would hurt her the most?

"I'm better now," her mother said. "It's been three months. Three months since—"

"Don’t even go there. Three months is nothing. I'll tell you what. When it's been three years, you show up here again. Maybe then we’ll have something to say to each other.”

“I got a job. It’s not much. I’m working as a dispatcher for a flooring company, but it’s a real job.”

Kelsey blinked with surprise. That was definitely a step in the right direction. Then again, when her mother had thousands of miles to go with hundreds of possible detours along the way, did that single step really mean anything?

Kelsey turned to Brett. “Let’s go.”

“No!” Carlene said. “Wait. Please.”

With a huff of irritation, Kelsey stopped and turned back, preparing herself for the usual onslaught of pleading and promises. At the same time she was keenly aware of Brett watching them, confused as hell, wondering what was going on. Well, he hadn’t seen anything yet. If her mother didn't leave very soon, this would turn into one of those horrible, tear-filled scenes that had burned themselves into Kelsey's memory from the time she was six years old.

But instead of plunging into her usual breakdown, Carlene reached into her purse and took out a piece of note paper. She held it out to Kelsey. "This is where I'm living now. And my phone number. Please take it."

Kelsey folded her arms and glared at her mother.

"If you'll just take it, I'll leave,” Carlene said.

With a sigh of irritation, Kelsey finally accepted it. Her mother closed her eyes. "I'm sorry, Kelsey," she said helplessly. "For everything. But this time it'll be different. I swear."

Kelsey had played this scene so often she had the lines memorized. But now, with Brett standing there, she needed to put an end to this performance.

"You said you would go,” she told her mother.

Finally Carlene turned away and pushed the elevator button. A moment later, the doors opened, and she was gone.

Kelsey immediately crumpled the note her mother had given her, walked to the trash can beside the elevator, and tossed it away. As far as she was concerned, that was the end of it.

* * *

As Kelsey headed down the hall, Brett followed in her wake, trying to fathom what had just happened. From all indications, she had just told her mother to go to hell. Her own mother. Kelsey had been known to be a little abrupt sometimes. A tiny bit irritable on occasion. But this behavior was something he simply didn't understand.

"What was that all about?" he asked.

"It's a long story. One I'd rather not go into."

Kelsey unlocked her apartment door and they went inside. When Brett dumped the stuff he'd carried halfway across the city onto her living room floor and she didn't object to the mess, he knew her mind was somewhere else. The sex they’d planned didn’t appear to be on her radar, either.

She tossed her purse on the kitchen counter, then turned and gave him a smile. "I'm hungry. How about a pizza?"

"That was your mother," Brett said.

"I said I don't want to talk about it."

"I don't get what just happened there."

"I have a coupon. What do you want? Sausage or pepperoni? Maybe both?"

"Neither. I want you to tell me what's going on."

Kelsey stared at him a long time, then gave him an offhand shrug. "Okay. You want to know what's going on? I'll tell you. My mother is an alcoholic. She's been an alcoholic since before I was born. I had the kind of childhood they make dark, depressing movies out of. She comes around every few years and swears she's changed, but she never has. I'm twenty-nine years old. I can hear the promises only so many times before I start to think, hey, maybe she's not going to deliver. And sure enough, she doesn't. There. That's the story. Now, are we going to have that pizza, or not?"

Kelsey opened a kitchen drawer and pulled out a neat stack of coupons, removed the paper clip, and thumbed through them.

"She seemed perfectly sober," Brett said.

"Anyone can hold it together for a few days. A month or two, even. Trust me—she'll fall off the wagon again soon enough.”

"What if this is the time she makes it stick? She came to see you, didn't she? She's asking for forgiveness."

"And she'll get that when hell freezes over. Ah! Here we go. Luigi's has a special going. A large meat lover's pizza for only twelve bucks. How does that sound? I’ll call."

"Kelsey."

"What?" she said, digging through her purse for her phone.

"She's your mother. Doesn't that count for something?"

"Exactly. She's my mother. She's not your mother. Stop projecting your experience onto me. You don't have a clue what she put me through."

Brett took a few steps closer. "Yeah? So why don't you tell me about it?"

"Because it's water under the bridge. Over and done with."

"Are you kidding me? Nobody treats her own mother like that if the whole thing is over and done with.”

Kelsey faced him. “Okay, here’s a story for you. Once on my birthday, she took me and a school friend to a bowling alley. She bought us hotdogs and nachos and let us bowl and play pinball. I even won a stuffed animal from one of those grabber machines."

"Sounds like fun."

"Oh, yeah. It was. Right up to the moment I realized that the whole time we were playing, my mother was drinking. By the time we left, she was so falling‑down drunk that we got on the wrong subway. We ended up in a part of town so dangerous I seriously thought we were going to get killed. I had nightmares about it for years."

Brett blinked, his expression turning sympathetic. "That's terrible."

“She ruined everything for me. Every single time. And the place we lived in was a mess. I’d clean our apartment as best I could, then go to school, and by the time I came back, she'd trashed it all over again.”

"She was home all day? What did she do for a living?"

"She was on disability. I was never quite sure what her problem was, but the checks kept coming, thank God. I think she was just really good at convincing people she couldn’t work. But that barely kept us alive. I babysat a lot to bring in more money. That didn't add much, but every little bit helped."

“She said she has a job now.”

“She can get one. The question is, can she keep it?”

“She seemed pretty determined.”

“You saw her for three minutes. I have a lifetime of listening to her. She’s always determined, right up to the moment she screws up all over again.”

“So I guess she didn’t exactly take care of you when you were a kid?”

"By the time I was eleven, I was taking care of her. I even forged her signature on checks to pay the bills. If I hadn't, we'd have frozen in the dark or been evicted.”

“My God,” Brett said. “I was lucky to be able to tie my own shoes and feed myself when I was eleven."

"You do what you have to do. I could go on, but I think you get the picture. So how about we give it a rest now?”

She looked at him defiantly, daring him to challenge her again. Instead, he eased up next to her, took her by the shoulders, and stared down at her.

"All I want to do is get to know you,” he said. “That’s all. But it’s hard to do that if you won’t tell me where you came from or what you’re thinking.”

Kelsey’s defiance slowly melted away, and her shoulders sagged with resignation. "You are so weird."

He let out a dramatic sigh. “What is it this time?”

“Do you realize you're the only man on earth who wants to know what a woman is thinking? It's supposed to be the other way around."

"Yeah, well, I'm one of a kind." He took her face in his hands and gave her a gentle kiss. "Tell you what. I need to take Boomer for a walk. Why don't you come along? We can order the pizza when we get back."

Kelsey finally nodded. At least now Brett had the answer to the question he'd asked her a week ago. He knew who'd hurt her. He just had no idea how to make the hurting stop.

* * *

Ten minutes later, Kelsey was sitting on a bench next to Brett, watching Boomer and his canine play group beneath the light of a couple of street lamps. Boomer play-growled with a Pug-like dog, then bounded after a tubby Lhasa Apso. He met every dog that approached him with a panting doggy smile and a tail-wagging invitation to play.

"Boomer has a lot of friends here," Kelsey said.

"Yep. He's a love at first sniff kind of dog."

"So where did you get him?"

"About a year ago, one of the waiters at Gianelli's said he'd gotten a puppy, but he was getting too big and he couldn't keep him anymore. Once I saw him, I wondered how the guy had missed the size of his paws, which is a pretty good indication of how big a dog is likely to get. I mean, when they're the size of Frisbees…dude. Get a clue, you know? He's gonna be a big dog."

"You live in a pretty small apartment. I'm surprised you adopted him."

"Yeah, but when the guy said that if he didn't find a home for him he was going to take him to the pound, where he’d probably eventually be put to sleep. I didn’t know if the guy was bluffing or not, but I didn’t want to take the chance. So in the end, Boomer got a home, and I got somebody who's happy to see me every time I walk through the door."

"How did you ever get him past Edwin? There's a twenty‑five-pound limit on dogs in our apartment building."

"You really don't know the answer to that?"

Then it dawned on her. "Oh, my God. What did it cost you?"

"Let's just say that for the money I slipped him under the table, Edwin should be wearing designer T-shirts and eating caviar on his Cheetos."

Kelsey smiled, then turned to watch Boomer and his friends. No doubt about it—a more social animal had never been born. He and Brett were made for each other.

They sat there a long time in silence, watching the dogs play. After a while, Brett put his hand over hers. She turned her hand over and held his, thinking how good it felt to be with him. Then she thought about what he'd said about wanting to get to know her, and he was right. If this went any further between them, how could she tell him that any discussion of her life before they'd met was off limits?

"I know you think I'm being terrible to my mother," she said quietly. "But you have to understand how many times we've been through this. I just can't do it again."

“I hear what you're saying. I know it’s hard for you.”

“She always says she’s going to change, but she never does. Never. She’s had problems as long as I can remember.”

Brett nodded.

“Actually, if it had just been her to deal with back then, it wouldn't have been so bad."

"What do you mean?"

More memories surfaced, each one worse than the last. Kelsey almost changed the subject, but when she glanced at Brett, he was looking back at her with such understanding that she found herself telling him something she’d never told anyone else.

"She brought men home," Kelsey murmured, staring at her hands. "A lot of them. Sometimes just overnight. Sometimes they stayed for weeks. You can imagine what I heard through the walls. I used to hide my head under my pillow and pray it would stop.”

Brett sighed and squeezed her hand.

“Some of the guys were pretty bad,” Kelsey said quietly. “Alcohol. Drugs. But there was one I actually liked. He took me to McDonald’s and even helped me with my homework once. I remember thinking please. Please be nice to this one. But it didn’t take long before my mother went off on one of her binges. She got screaming drunk and threw an ashtray at him. He left after that and never came back.”

"So where was your father?"

"Better question. Who was my father?"

“Oh, boy,” he said. “I'm sorry. That's rough."

They sat in silence a while longer. Boomer trotted up to Brett like a toddler checking in with Dad. Brett scratched behind his ears, and he galloped off to play again.

“Thanks for the concert today,” Kelsey said. “That was nice.”

“Glad you liked it.”

"It reminded me of something when I was a kid."

Brett froze. “Is that a bad thing?”

"No. It’s one of the only good things I remember.” She inhaled silently, then released the breath. “There was a woman who lived across the hall from us. She played the guitar. At night, when the chaos stopped and everything finally got quiet in that apartment, I could hear the music. It felt…I don’t know. Like I was on this beautiful island where everything was calm and peaceful. Everything around me was wild and crazy, but for those few minutes, I didn’t feel it. I used to close my eyes and pretend that woman was my mother and she was playing the guitar just for me. It was so nice when everything else around me wasn't.” She turned to look at him. “So that’s the kind of life I had as a kid. Pathetic, isn't it?"

"You turned out okay."

"Sometimes I'm not so sure about that."

"What do you mean?"

She didn't want to say it, because it made her sound even more pitiful. For Brett, life had been a breeze, so it was hard to sit next to him and not fervently wish she was somebody else, somebody who wasn't so wary and suspicious. Somebody who could see life through different eyes.

Through his eyes.

"You’re right,” she said, her voice a near whisper. “I do have hang-ups. I read a book about it once. It talked about how kids who had childhoods like mine tend to grow up with control issues. They felt helpless as kids, so they overcompensate as adults. In case you hadn’t noticed, I kinda like to be on top of things.”

Brett flashed her a tiny smile.

“And all I ever saw of relationships was my mother and all those men.” She paused, hating to say it. “Maybe it took something from me I can’t get back."

"No. That's not true. All the right feelings are in there. You just have to let them out."

Kelsey wasn't sure she believed that, but something about the way Brett said it made her feel as if it was at least possible.

"If you thought your mother was telling the truth now,” Brett said, “that she'd never have another drink again, would you forgive her for what she's done?"

“She’s not telling the truth, and she will drink again, so I guess that’s a moot point, isn’t it?”

Brett sighed. "I know it’s bad between you two. But maybe this time she’ll stick to it.”

“Fine. I hope she does. But she’ll be sticking to it without me.”

"Are you sure about that?"

Kelsey was silent for a long time, feeling the push-pull of fantasy versus reality. "Of course I'd like things to be different," she said finally. "But what kind of a fool would I have to be to think it would ever happen?"

“There's always hope."

Hope? He just didn’t understand. If you kept getting hit with a hammer over and over, the next time somebody holds it over your head, what do you do? Hope for the best, or prepare for the worst?

Of course she wanted more. She was desperate to wake up one morning in another world, one where she had a mother who was sober and normal and all the bad memories had disappeared. But Kelsey had no doubt her mother would go to her grave with a bottle in her hand, and when that happened, she had no intention of shedding a single tear.