Chapter 45

Cami

It was after eleven, and I was still in bed on a Sunday morning. That rarely happened, even when I stayed out late the night before. Then again, I rarely had Xander accompany me home and keep me up for another three hours. I’d been too tired to worry about the implications of Xander spending the night. Since it was nearly five in the morning when we both fell asleep, it was fair to say he hadn’t spent the night. His alarm had gone off at eight, and he’d dragged himself out of bed to head to band practice. Thankfully, I’d been able to go back to sleep.

My phone started buzzing on the nightstand, so I grabbed it to see who was calling. I was surprised to see it was my mom. While we weren’t fighting, we only spoke when I called to check on her. My mom had never been happy as a wife or a mother, and she preferred to keep her distance from me. She wasn’t one of those moms who thought she was the victim. She was the first to acknowledge that she hadn’t been a very good mom, and she was genuinely sorry. That didn’t mean she suddenly wanted to be a mother, but she’d tried to make it up to me. After my parents divorced, she used a large chunk of her share from the sale of their home to pay for my college tuition. For that reason, I helped out with her bills. Maybe it wasn’t the ideal mother-daughter relationship, but it’s what I had.

“Hi, Mom. Is everything okay?”

“Everything’s fine, Cami,” she assured me. “I just went out to get my hair done yesterday, and some people at the salon were talking about a rock band.”

“Don’t tell me you’ve suddenly developed a love of rock music and want me to help you find tickets to a show,” I teased.

My mom didn’t laugh because she didn’t have a sense of humor and had never been able to recognize when I was teasing her. “I still don’t like rock music. It’s too loud, and I don’t understand why anyone would want all those tattoos. Men with tattoos are unfaithful.”

“Not all men with tattoos are unfaithful,” I argued. Since my dad had tattoos, my mom was convinced all men with tattoos cheated on their wives and girlfriends. Once, I’d asked her if she thought it was something in the ink that made them stray, and she’d surprised me with a very detailed explanation of why men with tattoos cheated. It hadn’t made much sense, but I could tell she’d put a lot of thought into it.

“You simply can’t trust them,” she insisted. “That’s why I’m calling. At first, I told myself it was none of my business. You’re a grown woman, but I just can’t let this go on without saying something.”

I waited, already knowing what she was going to say. “Are you afraid I’m dating a man with tattoos?”

“I heard you’re dating some rock star,” she replied. “One of the women at the salon heard my last name and told me she’d heard this rock star was dating a woman named Cami Shaw.”

I hadn’t even considered telling my mom about my fake relationship with Xander. She didn’t watch much television, and the only celebrity news she kept up on involved the British royal family. I had two choices. I could tell my mom what was going on, but that was risky. If anyone brought up my relationship with Xander, she’d tell them it was a lie because she enjoyed those rare occasions she had juicy gossip to share. That’s why I decided to go with my second option and lie to my mother.

“We’ve been friends for quite some time, but things changed recently.” It wasn’t exactly a lie. The nature of my relationship with Xander had changed recently. I was merely leaving out the part about us deciding to have a dirty no-strings-attached fling.

“No,” was all she said.

“No?” I asked. “What do you mean by no? I’m an adult. I can do what I want.”

“That sounded very childish,” she pointed out.

“It doesn’t matter how it sounded. It’s the truth. I get to decide who I’m going to date.”

“Cami, I know I’m not a good mother. While I’m better than I was when you were a child, you still deserve more. I often wonder if hearing me argue with your father so often scarred you as much as me being distant with you.”

It had scarred me more, but I didn’t want to discuss my childhood or my parents’ failed marriage. “None of that matters now.”

“It does matter,” my mom insisted. “That rock star will cheat on you and hurt you. What if he gets you pregnant and you have to marry him?”

“Mom, it’s not the fifties,” I reminded her. “They have birth control, and women raise children alone. Hell, that was true when you got pregnant with me. You didn’t have to marry Dad.”

“I got pregnant with you on my honeymoon,” she argued. “You were just early.”

“Right,” I muttered. I’d been eight pounds and eight weeks early. “I forgot. Listen, Mom, you don’t have to worry about me. I’m fine. Now, if you don’t need help with anything, I have a few things to get done around the house, and then I need to stop by the hospital.”

“For a pregnancy test?” she asked.

Yes, my mom was a little off in the head.

“To see a patient,” I clarified, deciding against pointing out that I could take a pregnancy test at home. That would only lead to her asking how often I took home pregnancy tests.

“Okay.” She didn’t sound happy. “Please, just leave that inked devil before he destroys your life.”

Inked devil? My mom had never used that phrase before.

“Don’t worry, Mom. I’ll talk to you later.”

“Yes, later.” She ended the call without another word.

Looking at the time, I decided I’d eat and head to the hospital before I did my housework and errands. I smiled on the way to the bathroom. It was strange but sweet that my mom was worried about me.