“Hey, Mom,” I say from the sofa.

She jerks in shock and only relaxes when her gaze lands on me. “I didn’t see you in there.”

“Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you.” I take a deep, calming breath.

I put my cell phone aside—I’ve been playing with it absently while thinking about what to say to my mom.

I still can’t quite believe my own logical conclusion, but there’s no other possibility. Even Aubrey agrees.

I wanted to bring it up earlier, but I thought it would upset Aubrey when she was already too worried about other things. And it wasn’t like we had much time to discuss anything important during lunch.

“How was work?” Mom asks as she takes off her jacket. The bags under her eyes show just how exhausted she is. She takes a seat on the sofa next to me.

“I had the day off, Mom.”

“Oh? What did you do today?” she asks.

“I went skydiving . . . with my girlfriend.”

“You have a girlfriend? Since when?” Mom asks with a smile. Even in her fifties, after all the hardship she’s gone through, she still looks beautiful. “You should bring her home one of these days.”

I should just cut to the chase. This small talk is painful. “Mom, you remember my girlfriend from when we were still living in Vegas, the one who was at the wedding?”

Her whole body tenses. Her eyes widen with horror.

That only confirms my suspicions. She knows I know she’s done something she shouldn’t have done.

“Please don’t tell me she’s your girlfriend,” Mom says slowly when she recovers from her shock.

“She is,” I say. “I hope you don’t have a problem with that, because I intend to keep her in my life for a long time.”

“I can’t believe this. I told you to stay away from her, and you just started dating her instead?” Mom asks, getting straight on the offense.

“I didn’t just start dating her. I was already dating her when I was sixteen, until you made me break up with her.”

“We both cut contact with everyone in the city. I did it, too, remember? It wasn’t just you, and it wasn't just her. I told you, Vegas brought us bad luck and we had to get rid of every little trace of it.”

“And I guess it was just a coincidence that Aubrey’s dad also made her cut contact with me at the same time?” I ask.

Mom pauses. In a soft voice, she says, “I don't know anything about that. I was just following my palm reader’s advice.”

I repeat my question. “So you’re saying it was just a coincidence that Aubrey’s dad also made her cut contact with me at the same time?”

“You told me he never liked you. That’s just the kind of thing that overprotective dads do when their daughters date guys they don’t like.” Her eyes twitch, the way they used to when I was a little boy and she told me she was eating raisins even though I smelled chocolate on her breath.

“Mom, please don’t lie to me,” I say, exhausted from having already spent so much mental energy thinking about this all day.

“Does her dad know you’re dating her again?” Mom asks, a little too urgently.

“Why do you ask that? What does it matter?”

“Well, he’s a powerful man. There are many things he can do if he doesn’t like you seeing his daughter.” She tries to act like she’s only making a casual observation, but I can sense the fear in her trembling voice.

“Like what, Mom?” I ask, looking directly into her eyes, trying to find the truth. “What did he threaten you with?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ve never even met your girlfriend’s dad.” She glances away, avoiding eye contact.

“Mom, come on. You’ve always been a bad liar. I can see right through you.”

She goes quiet.

I always try to be kind to my mom, even when she's being difficult. It wasn't easy for her to live with my alcoholic dad, who also happened to have gambling addiction issues.

Growing up, I had to go to my friends’ houses to play with their newest toys, even though my dad had a decent job. And those weren't the only things I had to either borrow or go without. There were books and sports gear, too.

Those things seemed so important when I was younger and even though they don't anymore, I can't help feeling some anger over the fact that I could've had a decent childhood, had my dad not been such a piece of shit.

I’ll admit it did force me to develop good social skills. Having to depend on other people will do that to you. I learned to get people to like me so they’d give me a hand when I needed it.

It's a skill that's given me an edge in all kinds of situations, like when I had to convince a cop to let me go without a speeding ticket, or when I aced the interview and got a medical internship position at Oak Crest Hospital.

So I guess in a way, I owe my success to both my parents—my dad for neglecting me to the point where I had no choice but to toughen the fuck up, and my mom for keeping me alive.

I’ve always been grateful for the kindness my mom shows me. Because even though she's the woman who gave birth to me, no one put a gun to her head and made her love me.

Hell, my own dad was never anything but a mean asshole to me. Luckily for me, my mom’s the complete opposite. She was the first person to have shown me there’s love and beauty in the world, and they’re worth living for.

My mom has sacrificed so much for me, and I’d never dream of disrespecting her, but Aubrey was the second person after her who showed me love and beauty worth living for.

And right now, it fucking hurts to know that my own mom has gone behind my back to keep me apart from the girl I love. It tastes like betrayal.

“Mom, since you’re not talking, let me try to guess what happened, okay?” I say, finally, breaking the silence. “I think you were worried about money after Dad’s accident, even though we were going to get money from the insurance company.”

Mom stares vacantly at the clock on the wall, her facial expression flat and unreadable.

“Then,” I continue, “Dr. Lane, Aubrey’s dad, convinced you to take me away, far away from his daughter, in exchange for money.”

She remains still except for her fidgeting fingers and the rapid rise and fall of her chest as her breathing gets frantic. She’s definitely getting nervous.

“I’m right, aren’t I?” I ask.

My mom slowly turns her head to look at me. Tears have sprung to her eyes, suspended by her lower eyelashes, but she says nothing.

“How could you, Mom?”

I felt like dying when I couldn’t get in touch with Aubrey. I thought she’d finally seen how unworthy I was of her, and how much she could do better.

My mom saw my suffering, and she could’ve put a stop to it, but instead, she made up an elaborate lie about how Vegas was bad luck.

I can understand her motive—she needed the money and she thought I was just a teenager who was probably going to find another girl immediately anyway.

But what bothers me is the deception. It feels like such a slap in the face that she’d kept the lie going for an entire decade. Wasn’t I entitled to the truth at some point? But instead of talking to me like an adult, she’s been trying to fool me with stories about bad luck and palm readers.

Anger simmers within me as I watch my mom closely. I don’t want to miss this confession.  

“There was no insurance money,” she says softly. She blinks, and tears roll down her cheeks. “When your dad died, we had nothing in the bank. Zero. The car was a wreck. The house we lived in was a rental. I hadn’t worked in years.

“I should’ve worked. I know that now. I just thought… Well, I thought your dad had a good job, so even though we didn’t have savings, we were going to be fine.”

“Mom, you’re rambling,” I say, rubbing her arm to soothe her. She seems so upset I’m starting to feel bad for putting her through this. “So you invented the insurance money thing?” I ask.

“Yes. I was desperate,” my mom says, her voice shaky. “I didn’t even know how we were going to keep paying the rent. I was sure that we were going to lose the house and end up on the streets.”

“And then Dr.  Lane offered you a solution for your problem,” I say, without judgment this time. I had no idea things were that bad. I guess I was just a clueless kid after all, no matter how grown-up I felt at the time.

“Yes. He gave me money and made me promise to keep you away from his daughter. He said he was going to destroy you if you ever got close to his daughter again.” Mom pleads with her eyes. “That’s why you need to break up with her, A. Find another girl. Please. Plenty of girls would love to be with a handsome young doctor like you.”

“Mom, don’t be ridiculous,” I say as gently as I can, seeing as she’s so fragile right now. “I’m not breaking up with Aubrey just because of some deal you made with her dad ten years ago.”

“You don’t understand,” Mom says. “He said I had to pay him back the money if you ever get in touch with his daughter again.”

“So I’ll pay him the money,” I say with defiance. “Tons of people have debts. I can pay him back if he really wants that money.”

“No, A, it was…” Mom pauses and hesitates.

“It was what?”

“He gave me two-hundred thousand dollars,” Mom says in a small voice.

“Two-hundred thousand dollars?” I ask, a little louder than I intended.

“Yes.”

“Jesus. How much of it do we have left?” I scan the modest living room in our two-bedroom apartment, filled with cheap particleboard furniture. “We couldn’t have spent much of that.”

“Not much,” Mom says, casting her gaze down.

“What? Where did the money go?”

“Your dad, he… When he died, he owed a lot of money to some dangerous men. They came after us and threatened our safety. I had to pay them back . . . with interest.”

“Fucking assholes.” I ball my fists in anger.

Aubrey’s dad.The loan sharks. My own dad.

My mom and I have been fucked over by so many men it’s no surprise she’s stayed single this whole time.

“You’ll do the right thing, won’t you, A?” Mom’s voice is full of anguish. Her eyes continuously fill with water, even as tears keep streaming down her face. “You’ll leave her, won’t you?”