“Of course not. We love Fish.” She pauses. “What does he think of it here?”

“Well, he’s from a town like this on the other side of Columbus. So it’s normal to him.”

She shifts in her seat. “Do you think it could be normal for you?”

Nothing is normal for me anymore.

I blow out a breath and feel my spirits sink.

“I don’t know, Mom. This all happened pretty fast, and I didn’t have much time to plan out what I wanted to do.”

“That stupid shoulder injury,” she says, shaking her head.

Yeah. That stupid shoulder injury.

I regrip the steering wheel. “I had a phone call with my manager this morning. I’ve had a few offers come in that we need to take a look at when I get back to California.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yeah. One is for a baseball program on one of the streaming channels. Another is a cohost for a podcast. That might be fun.”

“You’d be great at that.”

I look at her and smile. Although that’s not what she wants me to do, I appreciate her encouragement.

“Mom?”

“What?”

“I love you.”

“Oh, honey.” She pats my arm. “You’ll never know how much I love you and how proud I am of you and how happy I am to have you around.”

Her words are sweet and, more importantly, genuine. They make me feel like a little boy, but I’ve learned in life that it’s okay to let your mom baby you. I don’t particularly understand it, but it’s where she seems to get her joy.

“Hey. I think we need to stop at Bud’s.” Mom twists in her seat and peers into the truck bed. “Yes. Pull in there, please.”

I do as instructed.

“Your dad put his golf clubs in the back. I can’t remember what he’s having done to them, but I remember him asking me to drop them off. Maybe he’s having them cleaned. Do people get golf clubs cleaned?”

I just laugh at her.

There are four cars in the parking lot. I take a spot between two other trucks.

“This place is always pretty busy, huh?” I ask as we climb out of the cab.

“Yes.” Mom shuts her door. “Bud does so much more than sporting-goods stuff. He organizes the Squash Festival in the fall. He does all the fundraising for the church. I think he’s the head of the tourism board too.”

I snort, grabbing Dad’s clubs out of the bed. “Bloomfield has a tourism board?”

“Well, I think it’s two or three people. But they get a lot of traffic through here, really. People come this way to hunt and fish and hike. The board helps them all know that we have Fletcher’s and Bud’s,” she says, waiting on me to get the door for her. “And the little market on the other end of town.”

The door makes some kind of animal call when I open it. Mom laughs at the ridiculous sound and marches right up to the counter.