Page 132 of Just Between Us

“Not a word.”

“I wasn’t gonna say a word.” I was actually going to say a few.

After a beat she meets my eyes. “You have a face right now.”

“That’s just my face.” I press my hands to my cheeks knowing damn well it’s anything but my normal face. “I thinkit’s nice. Henry’s nice. And you deserve someone who stops to buy you flowers on the way to dinner.”

She presses her lips together. “It’s not—we’re not—” She stumbles over her words and I can’t help smiling. “We’re just friends, Cassie.”

I arch a brow. “You know who else was ‘just friends’?” I put air quotes around the words. “Me and that man out there. And I assure you, we were anything but.”

Mom opens her mouth. Closes it. All the while, the pink staining her cheeks deepens considerably.

“But I’ll play along with you and your friend, if that’s what you want.”

Mom snorts a laugh, and I call Liam and Henry to eat.

“Coins ready?” Henry asks, looking around the table. Liam, Mom, and I all hold up matching quarters. “Let the scratching begin.”

We scratch in silence, the only sound the rasp of coin against paper.

“Nothing,” Liam says a minute later, tossing the ticket. “I never win these,” he grumbles under his breath.

I pat his arm in mock sympathy and hold up my losing card. “You can’t win everything, babe. I thought you learned that with poker.”

Liam’s eyes cut to mine and huffs out a laugh. “How ’bout you two? Anything?”

“Not a thing,” Henry says.

But Mom is still scratching. And scratching. We all watch as the color drains from her face and she sets the quarter down.

“Mom?”

She doesn’t answer, or even look up. She’s still as a statue, only her eyes moving across her ticket.

“Beth.” Liam leans forward. “What is it?”

She looks up, and her mouth opens but no sound comes out. I’m not sure if I should be concerned or not, but then she holds up the ticket for us to see.

Five thousand dollars. My mom just won five thousand fucking dollars from a scratch off.

Liam is on his feet before the rest of us have time to move. Rounding the table, he puts both hands under her arms and lifts her clean out of the chair.

“Liam,” she gasps, and then she’s laughing, feet dangling in the air, a winning ticket still clutched in her hand.

Henry and I look at each other across the table. He’s grinning so wide his eyes turn to slits and then he looks over at Mom who is still dangling from Liam’s arms.

This is it. Right here. This is the good stuff. Mom’s face lit up. Liam laughing, and Henry looking at her like she’s all he wants to see.

While nobody is looking, I turn my phone over and navigate to my notes app, where my unfinished list still sits. With a satisfied smile, I put a check mark next toGet to know my mom.

Done.

EPILOGUE

One MonthLater

I can count on one hand how many times I’ve driven my new SUV into town. Up and down the driveway, sure. But into town? I’m still very much a work in progress.