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When he hands them up to me and I flip through them, it isn’t a shock when I see several depictions of a girl with long, dark hair and a blue butterfly necklace. When Mina eventually sees these, she’ll be so impressed…. And embarrassed, like any teenage girl, of course.
“These are really nice, Dylan. You’re so talented. Who is this?” I ask, after seeing another woman he’d drawn but didn’t recognize as easily as my daughter.
“That’s his mother,” Dean answers, after glancing at it.
“Oh, wow.” I look at her sandy blonde hair, blue eyes, and infectious smile. “She’s beautiful.” From the image, I can tell that she and Dylan have similar button noses that were kind of tapped onto their faces.
“What picture did you use?” Dean asks.
“I didn’t. That’s just from memory.”
“Seriously? That’s really impressive, Dyl. I’m not even sure I could draw myself without some kind of external reference.”
The rain picks up a little bit, but it’s still manageable by the time we get to the store.
“Okay. Go nuts, kid,” Dean says. Dylan responds by barreling toward the drawing section.
“Did that upset you?” I ask, as we roam various aisles.
“What?”
“That drawing of Anna.”
“Oh, uh. No, not really. He has every right to do whatever he wants with her likeness.”
“I know. I just wanted to check in on you. I know the two of you don’t see her much. So, I wasn’t sure if even an artistic rendering of her could be a shock to your system.”
“Nah.”
I go to reach for his hand, but he pulls away. What the…? I could understand that maybe he didn’t want to risk his son seeing us, but it still is a bit hurtful. But I don’t bring anything up, and stay in the shadow while Dylan presents his findings. Dean pays for them, and we hop back into the car.
Unfortunately, we soon find out that the clouds aren’t the only things making the world darken around us.
“Anna?” Dean says, seeing her sitting on the porch of the farmhouse as we pull up.
“Mom!” Dylan bursts out of the car and hugs her.
“What are you doing here?”
“I was getting a connecting flight in San Fran, but the storms delayed everything. So, with nowhere else to go, I came here.”
“How did you even know the address?”
“Dylan gave it to me in a letter.”
Dean shoots a look at his son.
This seems like a private family matter, so I slowly sneak away.
Chapter twenty-three
Dean – Dylan’s Mom
I look behind me to apologize for the inconvenience to Mae, but she’s nowhere to be seen.
I’m so angry that she and I only briefly started getting close again, and here Anna comes to screw everything up. Just like she always did.
“Can I please talk to you in private?” I ask Anna.
