I had nothing for my mom, nonverbally and definitely not verbally, to explain what was going on with Merry.

What I wanted was to kick him in the shin, this my way of telling him to snap out of it at the same time asking him what the fuck was his problem.

That was the Cher way of dealing with things.

But after nearly blowing it with Merry, I needed to learn not to do shit like that. I couldn’t react, mouth off, or do something stupid and then face the consequences later. Not without risking fucking us up, and I’d promised myself I wouldn’t do that.

But this wasn’t Merry. Not even a little bit. I’d never seen him like this. Even when Tanner and Rocky were on the bumpy path of their reunion, something neither Merry nor his dad hid was just as bumpy for them, he didn’t get like this. Not when he had a shitty case he was investigating that took time and effort that, in the end if he closed it, only allowed him to give a small measure of relief to the people who’d had their lives irrevocably altered when the shit of life buried them under the stink.

“I hear you have a boat,” Mom noted, attempting to snap Merry out of it by engaging him in conversation.

“Yep,” he told his plate.

He said no more.

Well, that didn’t work.

“You got a boat?” Ethan piped up excitedly.

That got him. Merry looked to my son, the blankness leaving his face, and it softened.

“I do, bud,” he said quietly. “But, just to say, it’s for sale.”

I stared at him because I had no clue he was selling his boat. I’d actually never been officially informed he had a boat.

I didn’t do healthy relationships until now (arguably, especially at this moment), but that seemed like something to share, say, when he was hanging at J&J’s having a drink. Or perhaps when we were making out on my couch and feeling each other up last night after Ethan went to sleep. Or during dinner at Swank’s, waffles at my place, lunches (plural) at Frank’s, or in one of what I was now seeing were the not-very-informative texts he’d sent me.

“Why are you selling it?” Mom asked.

Merry looked to her. “In the market to get a house. Got a realtor; she sent some listings. Looked through eighteen of ’em. Didn’t like what I saw except for two, both outside my price range. To make ’em in my price range, I gotta liquidate some things for the down payment.”

I kept staring at him, because selling your boat might not be something that you’d share with the woman in your life but buying a house definitely was.

I wanted to be smart. Not get ticked or more freaked but instead twist that to something happy.

First, Merry out of that crappy apartment. Second, the idea he was doing that now, after he’d decided to take a shot at an us with me.