Page 15 of Bastain

“Not possible.” She asked him about Abbott. “What do you mean he’s going to be selling his funeral home? What did you say to him?”

“I didn’t say anything. I just listened to what he was saying. He already has a buyer all lined up, and he’s hoping to be in a house by fall. Just so he can cook in his house without it bothering anyone.” Bastain pulled out his cell phone. He was going to call him right now and get to the bottom of this. “Call him. See what he says. I’m betting that he’s going to tell you too that he’s tried to talk to you about it, but you just kept putting him off. That’s what I got out of our conversation anyway.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” His phone call went straight to voicemail. “He must be with a client right now. I know that he’d talk to me about this if it were true.”

“It’s true.” She reached for her call light, and he watched her push the number for the nurse. “I could use something for pain. Do you have anything I can take that’s not so harsh to me? I’ve had enough of that today.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” She asked him what he was talking about and finished her conversation with the nurse. “You’re saying that I’ve given you pain? I’ll have you know that I came here to see if you could play chess. I’m assuming since you’ve been talking to my family, you know that my dad and I played on occasion.”

“We never get around to talking about you at all, believe it or not.” He knew she was lying. She’d been getting all kinds of information about him from his brothers, and he wasn’t going to have it. “Your mom talks about you. She’s worried about you becoming an old man before your time. I told her you were too mean to die and that she would probably have you around for decades.”

“I don’t want you talking about me to my family. They’re off limits to you as of right now.” She said she’d been trying to get them to stop for days now. “Yet you keep pulling them back in. What is it you’re looking for? Money? I have a great deal of it if you want to know the truth.”

“Goody for you. I have some, too, thanks to my mom dying when she did.” He knew that he’d hurt her, but couldn’t stop himself. He told her again that he was going to put a stop to his family visiting her. “Good luck with that. As I said to you before, they like being around me. Especially your mother.”

“I’m going to take care of that right now.” He pulled out his cell phone and tried to remember his mom’s number. His head was hurting so bad because he was so pissed that he could barely see straight. As he was dialing her number, no longer trusting the speed dial for it, he was pissed off that it took her so long to answer. “What have you been doing? When I call, I expect you to answer me.”

He knew the moment the words were out of his mouth that he’d made a fatal error on things. Just as he was going to tell his mom that he was sorry, she hung up on him. It was no less than he deserved. Looking at Trinity, she was staring at him with her mouth open.

“That’s going to cost you.” He nodded and sat down. “I think you’re going to be paying for that little outburst for a long time.”

“She didn’t answer right away.” Trinity snorted. “Oh, what do you know? You don’t even have a mother.”

Again, he knew he’d gone too far. As soon as he stood up to apologize to her, she told him to get out of her room. When he didn’t move, she picked up the phone and threw it at him. If not for his quick reflexes, she would have hit him in the face.

“Get out of here right now. And don’t you dare return.” He said that he’d not meant what he said. “You told me once that you don’t lie, so I believe you meant every word. Get out before I call security and have you removed.”

No amount of begging her to forgive him worked on her until she finally rang for the nurse. What scared him so much was that she never raised her voice, only talking to him with her teeth clenched together. If she’d had anything in her mouth, she would have bitten it in two; she was so pissed. Going out of her room, he stood there for several minutes while he heard her sobbing. He’d done that. His bad mood had done that to her, and he had no one to blame but himself.

Walking down the hall, his cell phone went off twice. He knew it was one of his brothers, and he didn’t blame them for calling to ask what the hell he’d done. As the elevator closed around him, all he could think of was how he’d pissed off two women in one hour and that both of them meant the world to him. Thinking about what he’d been hiding from himself for so long, that he’d fallen in love with Trinity and had never said the words to her. Now he had blown that chance by being himself. A prick. Then it occurred to him what he’d just said to himself. He was in love with Trinity.

Going to his home, Mom wasn’t around, so he went to his room. He was going to have a pity party for himself, but Abbott was there waiting for him. Just as soon as he asked him what he’d been thinking, Bastain said that he didn’t know and deserved whatever happened to him.

“You made Mom cry. And hard. I was here with her when you called, and I heard what you said to her. What the fuck is wrong with you?” He asked him about selling the funeral home. “Yes, I’m selling it. That’s what I came here to talk to you two about. I talked it over with some friends, and they listened to me when I was talking about it.”

“Trinity.” He nodded. “She told me that I never listened to you. Did you try to tell me about it before?”

“You have a lot on your plate right now. What with moving and the court stuff going on. I knew that when I tried to talk to you.” He said that he should have been there for him. “It’s all right. Trin didn’t do anything but listen to me, and that’s all I needed. Someone to just not have an opinion about it, but would be a sounding board for me. It was nice.”

She’d not lied to him, was all he could think about. She’d told him the truth and put him in his place all at the same time. He started for his mom’s room when Abbott stopped him. He told him that she wasn’t here but in her garden.

“I’ll go and talk to her.” Abbott said that would be the best thing. “I know that I shouldn’t have said that to her. I don’t know where my head was.”

“Not on your shoulders where it should have been.” His mom came up the rest of the stairs and glared at him. “What do you mean, talking to me like that? I’ve never once had anyone speak to me that way, and I’ve been around a good many years.”

“I was pissed off.” She said she could tell. “Not at you. But…I was going to say I was mad at Trinity, but that’s not it either. I was ashamed that she knew things that I didn’t, and I wanted to lash out at someone. I might have been better off if I’d left my phone in the car.”

“What did you do to her that pissed her off at you?” He laughed. Only his mom would think that it was his fault. Or maybe they all would have. They liked her, she’d told him. And it was, really his fault. “I knew you’d gone to see her, but when I tried to call her, the nurse told me that her phone was broken. I’m assuming you had something to do with that as well.”

“She threw it at me.” Mom laughed. Then, when she tried to stop it by coughing. It didn’t work. “She ordered me out of her room and said that if I come back, she’s going to call security on me. I know that I was mean to her, but she has a hell of a temper.”

“Good for her.” Mom started down the stairs, and he followed. Abbott did as well, telling him about how he’d gotten a buyer right away and was excited about buying him a house that he could cook in. “You’ll love having your own place again, Abbott. I know that I do. Provided that I don’t have to kick your brother to the curb. What else did she have to say?”

“I’m not allowed to go in to see her at all. I might have mentioned that my brothers nor you would be coming too. I don’t think that made her any happier with me.” She said that it didn’t her either. “I’ve never seen anyone so mad before. But she didn’t raise her voice either. Debra would have been shouting to the heavens about how I treated her. All she did was kick me out.”

“Don’t expect your brothers not to go see her.” He said that he figured that out on the way home. “Me either. I’ll go and see her when I want. And when she gets out of the hospital, she’s going to need someone to stay with her, and I’ll do that too. Regardless of what you have to say.”

“I think we can manage her here. Though she might burn the house down to spite me, we’ll make room for her here so that she can get around in the larger rooms.” He still felt terrible for treating her the way that he had, and he was going to make up for it. Even if she tossed a chair at him, he was going to be down on his hands and knees until she forgave him. His mom, too.