After she took a sip and set it back, he called, “Ma.”
She looked at him.
“I’m proud of you. I’m happy for you. And if he fucks with you, he’ll never see me again.”
She didn’t look happy about that.
“Axl.”
“I’m being very serious.”
“It has pained me for years, how he treated you. More, how I didn’t intervene. And I offer no defense for either. But, darling, he does love you and that would destroy him.”
“Then he better not fuck with you.”
“You really shouldn’t say the F-word, sweetheart,” she murmured. “It’s vulgar.”
He grinned. “I’ll refrain when I’m around you.”
She looked horrified. “I hope you don’t use it around Hattie.”
“Hattie’s a millennial, Mom. We’ve embraced the F-word. We don’t think of it as a curse word at all.”
She burst out laughing.
Christ, she looked pretty laughing.
He tried to think of the last time he saw his mom laugh.
He couldn’t remember.
Jesus.
He also hadn’t been a very good son.
“I didn’t look out for you either,” he admitted.
“That’s not your job.”
“Yes, it is.”
She shook her head, not in a negative, in a “What am I gonna do with my boy?”
“We need to do this more often,” he told her.
“I’d like that,” she replied, a light beginning to shine in her eyes that wasn’t pretty.
It was gorgeous.
“Then we will.”
Hard part done.
Good things ahead.
Now it was time to enfold his mother into his life.
“Now, I gotta give you the heads-up about Don, Hattie’s dad. It looks like things are on a good path, and he knows not to be a dick to her around me …”
Her eyes got big and her face paled.
But Axl kept going.
“But you never know. So before you meet him and spend time with him, if there’s a weird vibe, it’d be good for you to know why it’s there.”
The mussels came before the Dom.
And mother and son had lunch.
In the end, he had half a glass of champagne.
Because seriously.
It was a celebration.
* * *
Axl was on his way back to the office from lunch when he made his decision.
Hattie said that Don could be a charmer.
And his mom seemed like she had it going on.
But today was a big day and a big change.
And she needed everyone she could get in her corner.
Bottom line …
They were all going to be a family.
So he called Don.
Hattie’s dad answered quickly.
“Hey, son. All good?”
It was weird, though not in an entirely bad way, that it kinda felt good when Don called him “son.”
“All good, Don. Listen, just so you know, my mom left my father today. She’s coming out with us tonight.”
“Well, shit, Axl, I’m sorry.”
“I’m not. My dad’s a dick.”
“Right,” he muttered.
“She seems like she’s doing good, I just wanna make sure that keeps going. They were together for thirty-six years. We gotta look after her.”
When he replied, there was a lowering of Don’s voice. It was significant.
It said he was taking this seriously.
It also said it meant something to him that he’d been asked.
“We’ll see to her, Axl,” he promised.
“Great, Don. Thanks.”
“Are you picking up your mother?”
“Her name’s Rachel and yeah.”
“How about I meet you at the restaurant so you and Hattie don’t have to be driving all around Denver picking up your parents.”
“That’d work, thanks.”
“Not a problem. See you then.”
And yeah.
There it was.
They were going to be a family.
“Yeah, Don,” he replied. “Later.”
* * *
As usual, she was the first headliner to come out.
Before she did, they brought the lights down.
And during the opening of the song there was nothing, just a muted shine coming from the black surface of the stage.
So it nearly blinded you when the spotlight came on Hattie, flying through the air on the first drum crash of U2’s “Where the Streets Have No Name.”
He felt Don shoot straight in his seat, heard his mother’s quickly drawn breath.
But Axl didn’t take his eyes off her.
She was in a black leotard that had swathes of material crossed over her breasts, a mock turtleneck, exposed shoulders but gathered material tight down her upper arms to her wrists. The back was exposed except for a narrow band along the middle. Some parts of the bodysuit were sheer, and there was a filmy skirt that went to her knees and floated around her.
Her pointe shoes were red.
The beat of the song was fast, Axl had no idea how she kept up, arms out, heels down and crossed, up on pointe, down, up, down, and again, again, again.
But before Bono shared he wants to run, she swept her leg around and up nearly to her nose before it came down.
She turned and took only two steps before she was soaring again.
Back arched at an impossible angle, arms up and graceful, front leg straight, back leg in a curve cutting through the air like it had weight, holding her up.
And she could fly forever.
Christ.
It slowed down a bit then, and she used the entire stage, interpreting the song with every inch of her body, the room dark, the only light following her.