The Seat They Never Saved and the Offer I Finally Took novel · Chapter 14 of 24

Chapter 14: Mother's Kitchen

My mother put the kettle on at one in the morning.

I sat at the yellow kitchen table where I'd done my homework.

The same sugar bowl sat in the same spot.

"You knew," I said.

"I knew Tobias called." She set a mug in front of me. "I thought you knew too. He told me you did."

"When?"

"The first Sunday. He said, Mrs. VanderVeen, it's Tobias Kell, Lena asked me to check on you while I'm overseas."

"I never asked him that."

"I figured that out in about a month." She sat down across from me with her own tea. "By then he'd fixed the gutter by phone. He'd found me a man for the furnace."

"And you let it go on."

"He asked me to."

My mouth fell open.

"Not the first month," she said. "After. He said, please don't tell her it's me. She's happy with Connor, and she doesn't need to owe me anything."

"Mom."

"I told him that was foolish."

"What did he say?"

"He said, I know."

She turned her mug a quarter turn on the table.

"Your father asked him, you know."

I went very still.

"The last week, at the hospital. You were in the cafeteria getting coffee for the three of us, and your father had Tobias sit by the bed."

I remembered that week as a wet, gray blur.

I didn't remember being sent for coffee.

"What did Dad say?"

"He said, she'll tell you she's fine. She's never fine. Keep an eye on her."

I put the mug down because my hand wasn't steady.

"And Tobias said, yes, sir."

"That was the whole thing?"

"Two sentences. I was in the doorway." Her eyes were wet, and she didn't wipe them. "He's been keeping that promise for three and a half years, honey. He just did it from behind somebody else's face."

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