We went out the next day and spent the entire day shopping (neither of my children was averse to either of their parents dropping a load of cash on them, one thing that hadn’t changed), after which we had dinner out and went to see a movie.

And Auden drove as I sat beside him, Pippa in the back seat, and we went to the furniture place. I fell in love with two lounge chairs I bought on the spot (and could tell, even though neither said much, though Pippa mumbled, “They’re pretty cool,” that my kids liked them too) and paid a fortune for shipping.

We stopped for lunch on the way to, and after we drove back, they went home to their father’s.

Through this, they were not affectionate. They were not chatty. They sometimes were surly, but that was thankfully rare. Mostly they were indifferent or acted like they were putting up with me.

But they gave me the whole weekend.

And they spoke to me.

So I’d take that.

Oh, yes, I’d take it.

Absolutely.

Chapter Eleven

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A couple of days after my children left, I was rushing to get ready for my date with Bradley.

It was our third.

And it was not working.

Yes, he was good-looking. Yes, he was interesting. Yes, he was interested in me.

But what I was trying not to admit to myself, and failing, was that he wasn’t Mickey.

He wasn’t so beautiful it almost hurt to look at him. He didn’t make me feel so hard I lost sight of everything, even if with Mickey, much of what I felt with him was angry.

Mickey was not an option for me. He didn’t find me attractive. I knew that.

And he’d still ruined me.

Also, who actually did make people call them Bradley?

That reminded me of my father, who persisted in calling my brother Lawrence, when my brother hated that and everyone, even my mother, called him Lawr and he allowed me (and my kids) to call him Lawrie.

So I was going to have to end it with Bradley, something I had no clue how to do because that, too, was something I hadn’t done in decades.

Fortunately, in all the time he’d been gone, Boston Stone had only called twice, and one time I had been working at Dove House so he left me a message (that I didn’t return), and the other time I’d been having lunch with Ruth and Dela so it was rude to talk to him, except briefly.

In that brief time he’d told me he was coming home imminently, so I’d have to deal with him too.

I could have worse problems, I knew, having a husband who’d ended it with me. Being on the other side of that was always the wrong side to be.