I was not.

Ethan never knew that and he never would.

Thinking on this was not much better than thinking about Merry, so I quickly made Trent a cup of joe the way he liked it. I nuked it, since I’d turned off the half-empty pot before I took off to slam my head against the brick wall of my life. When the microwave dinged, I handed him the mug and leaned a hip against the counter across the room from him, leveling my eyes on him.

“What’s up?” I repeated my question of earlier.

Trent took a sip and put the coffee on the counter beside him.

Not granite counters. Not marble. No fucking way. There wasn’t a granite, marble, or trendy cement counter within a five-block radius.

Mustard-yellow, old-style Formica. This matched the fridge and the stove, both having been in that house since America celebrated its bicentennial.

The dishwasher had bit it and didn’t match, which sucked. But all the appliances, cabinets, countertops, and even the old-school linoleum floor were in excellent shape. I’d worked with it, and the kitchen was just as boho eclectic as the rest of the house, with vintage nostalgia thrown in.

I loved it.

I didn’t take it in right then, however.

I watched Trent reach behind him and pull something out of his back pocket.

It was an envelope, whatever was inside making it thick, and he set it beside his coffee mug on the counter before picking the mug up and taking another sip.

Only then did he look at me.

“Been savin’ awhile, me and Peg,” he said.

“Savin’ for what?” I asked.

“For that,” he answered, nodding his head down to the envelope. “Seein’ as I wasn’t around and didn’t do what I should’ve for my son, been savin’ to try to make that up just a little bit.”

Oh shit.

“There’s three thousand, five hundred dollars in there,” he went on.

Shit.

It was safe to say I was not rolling in it. But Feb and Morrie paid a decent wage; their bar was established and popular so they could. I also made tips, good ones, so I always had cash on hand. And I didn’t have to pay for anyone looking out for Ethan. When I moved to the ’burg, Mom got a job and moved there about six months after me. If she didn’t look after Ethan while I was at work, Jackie did. Or Feb, if she wasn’t working. Or Mimi, since she had a slew of kids herself, one more was no skin off her nose. Vi was always happy to be on call too. Even Jessie took a turn every once in a while. She was a whackjob (a lovable one, but definitely a whackjob) and she didn’t like kids, but she liked Ethan.

That list went on and all I had to pay was markers for my friends helping out, something I did whenever they needed me to do it.

But I’d do that anyway.