Page 16 of If I Didn’t Have You

“Move over, little lady. I’ll take care of this part,” Jeff grinned, taking my seat.

“It’s just a computer,” Ben muttered for the second time.

“It’s the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen.”

I heard the scoff from behind me, but I was too enthralled in my new machine to pay any attention to him.

“You know, it’s getting on dinner time,” he reminded me.

“Uh-huh,” I murmured, watching as Jeff took me through display setups. “I can put in pictures? Like my own pictures and they’ll be on the screen?”

“Well, you have to upload the pictures first, but I can help you with that.”

“Yeah, he can help you,” Ben said, wandering over. “Maybe after you make dinner.”

“Now, what about this?” I asked, pulling out my brand new iPhone. “Can I put pictures on this?”

“You can take pictures on that,” Jeff chuckled. “Man, I didn’t realize you were living in the past.”

“Well, it’s not like anyone around here thought to get me a smartphone,” I said, narrowing my eyes at my husband over my shoulder.

“You never asked for one,” Ben spat.

“Either way, you kinda dropped the ball, Pop. She was still using a flip phone. How could you let her walk around like that?”

“What the hell does she need a smartphone for? And why am I responsible for getting her one? Clearly, she can get one on her own if she wants one!”

I shoved to my feet, my anger spiking as I stared down my husband. “Yes, I can get one for myself, but you know what would be really great? Having my husband surprise me one of these days with a gift instead of forgetting about me every Mother’s Day, or leaving me to stuff my own stocking at Christmas.”

“Santa doesn’t stuff my stockings?” Jeff gasped.

“You like doing that!”

“For the kids!” I argued. “They’re all adults now. Someone should be looking after me as well. Or does that only apply to husbands who can’t seem to do anything for themselves?”

Jeff hissed in a breath, shoving back from the desk. “You know, I think I have a better charger for you. At my house. Across the property. Where I’m not part of this,” he muttered, fleeing the room.

Once he was gone, Ben turned back to me, the anger on his face rolling off him like steam, but he had nothing on me.

“Alright, so I don’t do enough for you, is that it?”

“It’s not about whether you do enough. It’s the effort, or lack thereof, that’s put into your gift-giving.”

“Fine, you want to talk about gift giving,” he snapped. “How about this past Christmas? You didn’t do a damn thing for me.”

“I got you the new tool thingy you wanted!”

“The kids got that for me.”

“And who do you think picked it up, paid for it, and wrapped the damn thing? The only thing they did was take credit for it when it was unwrapped!”

He flinched back, spinning away from me. “Alright, but I gave you that card for Mother’s Day. Don’t say I never do anything.”

I barked out a laugh at that. “You mean the one that was still in the bag with the receipt, not signed, and not in the envelope?”

His jaw dropped open before snapping shut. “I put in the effort.”

“No, putting in the effort would have required you to take the card out of the bag, sign it, put it in the damn envelope, and hand it over to me. Handing me the bag doesn’t count as effort.”