Irene would keep calling until he finally wore down and answered. By that time, she would have worked up a head of steam as to how he was always doing things to annoy her (which he wasn’t) and provided her even more ammunition for whatever bee she happened to have in her bonnet.

‘Hey, Mom,’ Ward greeted and even he heard the stiffness in his voice. He took a deep breath and tried to lighten it. ‘How are you?’

‘I’m fine, thanks for asking. I just got off the phone with your Aunt Helen and she wanted me to say “hello”, so here I am – saying “hello”.’

‘How’s she doing?’ he asked, trying not to let his hackles rise. He already had a feeling where this was going.

‘Oh, she’s the same as she always is. Kept going on and on about some guy she’s falling for online, and I tried to tell her not to forget that it might be some scam that she’s falling for, but she didn’t want to hear that. She didn’t want to listen. Why in the world is that? Why don’t people ever want to listen anymore?’

For as long as he could remember, Irene McKenzie’s problem with the world was that she knew what was going on more than anyone else, but no one ever wanted to listen to her.

‘You know people – they already have their minds made up about things and that’s all there is to it.’

‘It’s like when I used to tell you that you needed to go to college and get yourself a business degree. I would tell you over and over and over again to get a business degree. Did you ever listen, though? No – no, you didn’t. You just wanted to play stupid games all the time.’

‘Mom, that “stupid game” I play got you a nice house and a very nice lifestyle,’ Ward retorted, careful to keep his tone casual.

‘Maybe,’ Irene replied, ‘but you can’t keep doing it forever, can you? You’ve already been out for months. And what about when you’re too old to play or worse, the Panthers dump you altogether? You’ll wind up bagging groceries at Walmart.’

‘Mom, with my investments, I’m confident I’m going to dodge that bullet.’ He forced a chuckle, willing himself not to rise to the bait. But somehow his mother knew exactly how to hit him in his weak spot. And in all honesty, bagging groceries sounded like a fine old job to him.

‘Guess who I ran into?’ she asked then, completely ignoring what he’d just said. ‘You’ll never guess.’

‘I’m sure it’s someone who doesn’t listen to you,’ Ward muttered.