“He said that Mom had turned into such a witch that he was going to go to court and make me live with him and his new wife, Heather. I don’t like her and she doesn’t like me.”
He was glad Eli’s face was down so he couldn’t see the smile on Frank’s face. “Tell me everything that’s been going on.”
Eli began talking in a steady, quick stream and Frank listened. What he heard was the story of an angry woman. When Miranda had returned from her time with Frank, she’d declared that she was going to quit being a naive, gullible woman who believed in romance.
“She gave all her novels away,” Eli said. “And she changed our house. She threw out all the pretty little things she had. It’s all . . . I don’t know, cold now. Does that make sense?”
“Yes,” Frank said and thought of his own houses, where he’d outlawed anything that made them different from one another.
“Right after she got back, Dad came over and she was mad.”
“What did he say?” Frank was frowning.
“He called Mom a slut, and said she was spending nights with men in bars and that he was going to get a lawyer and take me away from her.”
“Have you ever heard him say that before?”
“Only once when I was little. That time I got scared and so did Mom. But this time she wasn’t scared. She wasn’t even angry. You know what she did?”
“I have no idea.”
“She told me to pack my bag, that I was going home with my father. She said she’d deliver all my computer equipment to his house that afternoon and that she’d send Heather a list of foods I won’t eat.”
“What did your dad say?”
“I was really, really scared. I held on to my mother, but she pushed me to my father. He said Mom was crazy and he left. He hasn’t been back to our house since then.”
“Good for her,” Frank said. “You know, don’t you, that she wasn’t going to give you away?”
“I’m not sure, but I think you’re right.”
Frank held Eli to arm’s length and looked at him. “Your mother loves you very, very much. You are her whole life.”
“Not anymore,” Eli said. “Now she doesn’t talk. She says she has to work more and she needs to go back to school and . . .” He looked at Frank. “Did you really ask her to marry you?”
“Yes, I did.” Frank took a deep breath. “I did a very stupid thing: I fell in love. No, don’t look at me like that. It was all right to fall in love, but I was afraid and I let her get away from me.”
“Why were you afraid? I love my mother, but I’d never run away from her.”
He shook his head. “I don’t know how to explain it. In all my life I’ve never needed anyone. Maybe it was because when I was growing up, I had so many people around me. It was a huge family and I always had a lot of responsibility. I think maybe at an early age I decided I wanted to be different and separate. Or maybe it was just that I didn’t want to be like them. Can you understand that?”
“Yes. I’m different from other kids.”
“You and I are misfits, aren’t we?”
“What about my mom?” Eli urged.
“I loved her. I just looked at her and loved her from the very first.” Frank smiled. “Actually, at first I thought she was something other than what she was, and that made her angry. But then I saw that she was a sweet, gentle woman.” He smiled again. “Well, not too gentle.”
He paused. “You know what I liked best about your mom? She judged me on my own merits, not on my money or even on my looks. She just told me she didn’t like me and didn’t want to be near me. She even ran out the door of the cabin and tried to walk back to Denver.”
“She has no sense of direction.”
Frank looked surprised. “That’s true, but how did you know that?”
“It’s women. My mother has none and Chelsea has none,” Eli said.
“Better not let any woman hear you make such a generalization. Anyway, I wanted her to stay and cook for me, so I offered her a great deal of money. But do you know what she asked for?”