“May I ask what happened to your mother and her side of the family?”
I chuckled lowly and confessed, “My mother was a cocktail waitress at a high-end lounge my father frequented. When I was born, he paid her a large sum of money with the agreement that she would disappear forever or risk being sued for the small fortune he’d given her. My father spent the next eighteen years choosing business and pleasure over me. He never wanted me; he just needed to leave his legacy behind to someone.”
“Did you try to find your mother when you were older?”
“I did. She died of an overdose when I was two. She had spent her newfound wealth partying like there was no tomorrow.”
“I’m—”
“No condolences, Kiyah.” She stared at me blankly with those expressive brown eyes. I could see the gears turning in her head as she attempted to find something soothing and comforting to say. Human nature was amusing but in a dire way. The pressure to be seen asgoodorkind,or to say the right things, was obscene if you asked me.
It’s a good thing I never subscribed to this ideology of people-pleasing. It’s fun to pretend and watch how easily people like her grandmother and sisters fall for it. I’ll have Kiyah eating out of my palms in no time. She’s already looking at me like I’m one of those shivering puppies on an ASPCA commercial. How tragic.
“No condolences,” she finally repeated.
“Good. If you want to feel sorry for me, then you can feel sorry for my inability to secure proper childcare for my son.”
She raised a perfectly manicured brow in question. “How is that?”
“I’ve gone through nine nannies, and none seem to be good fits.”
“At nine, you should question if you’re the problem. Statistically speaking, there were probably some good ones in the bunch,” she insisted.
And there were, but they were dismissed because they weren’t you.
I forced a laugh out—one that would confirm “my guilt.”
“You might be onto something. Perhaps I was too picky; however, my son is all I have left, so his care is my top priority. My decisions to dismiss the nannies were based on Pete’s interaction with them.”
“What do you mean?”
I sighed and prompted her to return my son to me. I smiled at the slight hesitation before she handed him over. I kissed his warm cheek before cradling him in the crook of my arm.
“Pete has been experiencing behavioral issues as of late.”
“What kind of behavioral issues?”
“He has these crying fits every once in a while, and most of the nannies experienced difficulties calming him down. Recently, I’ve had to leave campaign events to get him settled.”
“I get it,” she whispered, toying with the pendant around her neck. “Grieving at his age is so confusing. It’s difficult to process that your loved one is there one day and the next day you’ll never see them again. I had crying fits like that for a few years after my bio father’s death,” she confessed.
“And how did your parents manage?”
She shrugged lazily and stared at the half-eaten salad on her plate that had long since wilted. “They created a safe space to let me feel. I was never rushed to ‘get over it’ or made to feel guilty that I was still missing Rory despite the wonderful stepfather I had.”
“Do you notice that you speak about your father a lot?” I questioned.
“I hadn’t noticed.”
“Why do you think that is? Any quarrels with your mother?”
“No, my mother is great. It’s just….”
A classic case of daddy issues.
“I don’t know. It hurts more to let him down, I guess.”
“What do you mean by that?”