I was nervous, my hands twisting around each other as I stood outside the building. It was a squat building, glass and chrome everywhere, kind of like Stone Security’s main offices. My name was on the door: Sullivan. Sullivan and Myers, it said.

My son’s office.

Alli offered to come along, held my hand across the breakfast table as we discussed it. She knew how nervous I was, but she understood when I told her I needed to do this alone. I wanted her here. I wanted the security of her presence, of the trust and belief in her eyes. But I needed to talk to Conor before I introduced them.

I needed to take this final step into the future alone.

I didn’t know how he’d react. The last time I saw Conor, we stared awkwardly at each other over a spaghetti dinner neither of us wanted or enjoyed. Before that, there’d been a lot of tears. We had both been in the tight grip of grief after Gloria. I wasn’t sure I was ever going to find a way out of it. And I didn’t know how to help him through it.

I was afraid it would be that way now, too.

I took a deep breath and opened the door, walking with all the confidence I could muster to the reception desk.

“May I help you?” the pretty blond at the desk asked, her head tilting slightly to one side as she studied me. There was curiosity in her blue eyes, naked curiosity that suggested more than the usual disconnected interest in a new arrival.

“I’m here to see Conor Sullivan. Is he around?”

Her eyes widened, and a big smile broke across her pretty face. “You’re his dad, aren’t you?”

“I am,” I said, somewhat surprised.

She nodded as though she were confirming the thought for herself. “I see your picture on his desk all the time. And he looks like you.”

“You think so?”

“Yeah. Those eyes…” She smiled again. “You don’t see gray eyes like that just anywhere.”

She stood and walked around her desk. “Follow me. He’s in a meeting, but he should be done soon.” We went up a set of stairs that opened onto a loft above the main floor. There were several offices, most of them with glass walls. Faces looked up, eyes following us as she led the way to the back of the floor to a large office that looked down on the center of the industrial section of the city.

“You can wait here. He’ll be in soon.”

“Thank you.”

She hesitated at the door. “I’m glad you’re here,” she said softly. “Conor will be, too.”

“I hope so.”

I watched her go, wondering if there was more than just an employee-employer relationship between that woman and my son. I kind of hoped so.

I turned and looked out the windows for a moment, wondering what Alli was up to. She said she might go shopping, but… In front of me, there was a draft table with technical plans on it that I couldn’t understand if I stared at them all day. His desk was fairly clean, the glass top covered in neat piles of paperwork. There were framed pictures there, too. I picked one up, surprised to find it held a candid photo of Gloria, Conor, and me from the day he graduated high school. There was another of his college graduation, and one of me and Gloria taken the Christmas before the cancer came back.

I stared at that photograph, at the calm in my wife’s eyes as she studied my face instead of facing toward the camera. I was facing the camera. I should have been looking at her, drinking in every bit of her during every possible moment.

“That’s a good picture of her, don’t you think?”

I turned to find my son standing in the doorway. He was taller than I remembered. He had light brown hair like his mother’s, but he did have my eyes. And my long nose, too, poor boy. He was fuller than he’d been the last time I saw him, strength in his shoulders that I’d never noticed before. And there was this smile on his lips that reminded me so much of Gloria that it physically hurt just to look at it.

Tears welled up in my eyes, much to my humiliation. I couldn’t speak, and when I tried, nothing more than a strangled sob came out. I held out my arms, and he came to me like he used to do as a child, his own sobs slipping from his lips as he buried his face against my shoulder. He didn’t quite fit in my arms like he once did, but that was all right. He was still my boy.

“I’m sorry,” I said against the side of his head, my breath blowing his short hair around. “I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have let so much time go by.”

“It’s okay,” he mumbled, his arms tightening around me. “You’re here now.”

We clung to each other for a long time, my boy and me. This part of Gloria that I still had, this last part that would never not be a part of my life. In him, she would always live, and that was more of a relief than I could ever put into words.

I loved her. I loved her more than life. I would always love her.

How lucky was I to have two such wonderful women in my life?

And to have this boy, too?

 

 

We went to lunch at a place not far from his office. It wasn’t spaghetti but Chinese food, some sort of chicken with peanuts and noodles that was a hell of a lot better than I thought it would be.

“You’re still in Ellaville?”

“I am.”

“I heard the sheriff was arrested along with half his deputies.”

I nodded, picking at my food. “It’s a long story. But I’m not a deputy anymore.”

“Really?” Conor’s eyes widened. “When did that happen?”

“Three months ago. I work for a private security firm now.”

He laughed. “You always called those people rent-a-cops.”

“I did. And I probably still will. But we do good work.”

“That’s good, dad.” He nodded. “As long as you’re happy.”

There was so much I wanted to say to that, and I didn’t know where to begin. “Your mother, she would be so proud to see your offices.”

Conor nodded, his head tilted slightly. “I hope so.”

“She was always so proud of you. She used to carry this picture of you to her chemo sessions and show it to the nurses, remind them of why she had to get through that, you know?”

Conor shook his head. “You never told me.”

“She was a fighter, your mother. She fought until the final moments, determined to fight the odds.” I shook my head. “She told me she wouldn’t go unless I promised her that I’d watch over you and that I would go on with my life. I believed her.”

“She was stubborn.” Conor looked up at me. “She loved you.”

“She loved us. We were everything to her.” I set down my fork and sighed. “You know she talked about it a lot there at the end. Told me she had no regrets. I always worried that she did, that she wished she hadn’t gotten involved with me. But she swore there were no regrets.”

“I got in touch with her family.”

My eyebrows rose. “You did?”

Conor nodded. “A couple of years after she died. I was on Facebook and, on a whim, did a search of her family name. I found her brothers.”

“You talk to them?”

“They’re not that bad. One works in the same bank where his father worked. The other is a lawyer.” Conor shrugged. “I have cousins, a couple of boys and a girl.”

“They talk much about her?”

“They told me things. Said you were the best thing that ever happened to her.”

That surprised me. “Seriously?”

“Yeah. They say she would have died if she’d stayed there. They were glad you got her out, though they would have liked if you’d waited a few more years.”

“You were in a hurry.”

Conor nodded. “Mom always said that.”

“It was true. She had such trouble with you. Wouldn’t stay put like you were supposed to.”

“Is that why you never had more kids?”

I nodded. “I couldn’t put her through that again. Broke her heart, but she understood.”

“Would you ever consider having kids now?”

It was the perfect segue. Did I dare take it?

Conor watched me. He could see there was something on my mind. But rather than wait for me to confess, he decided to do it first.

“That girl in reception? The one who showed you up to my office?”

“Yeah?”

“Her name’s Adrian. We’ve been seeing each other for a couple of months.”

“That’s great, Conor. I thought there was something there.”

He nodded. “She’s pregnant. Just found out last week.”

Wow! Pregnancy news was all around me. I stood and walked around the table, dragged him in for a hug.

“That’s great, son!”

He smiled, but there was something weak in it.

“What?”

He shook his head. “I just…I love her, Dad. I really love her.”

“Well, that’s good. Right?”

His eyes clouded over. “What if…what if something goes wrong? What if she’s like Mom, and she has a hard time?”

“Medicine has changed a lot in the last twenty-seven years, Conor. I’m sure whatever happens, her doctors can handle it.” He nodded, but he still seemed a little uncertain. I gripped his shoulders, aware we were in a restaurant full of strangers but not really caring. “Babies are hope, son. They’re a confirmation of love and everything good that still exists in this world. This is good news.”

He nodded, the clouds slowly leaving his eyes. “Maybe.”

We settled back in our seats and picked at our food for a few minutes. Then he looked at me. “What about you? What’s happening in your life?”

I studied his face for a long moment. “You know I love your mother, right?”

“Of course.”

“You know I’d never do anything to dishonor her memory.”

“Of course.”

I nodded slowly. “I’ve met someone.”

Conor’s expression was neutral. “Is it serious?”

“Yeah. It’s serious.”

“What’s she like?”

I laughed because I didn’t know how to describe Alli. She was a force all her own. “Come to dinner tonight, and you’ll see for yourself.”