Free Maybe Never by Nia Forrester

them now, she was sure that was true, but at the time she’d been stunned.
    Her own mother had responded to the news with silence. At first. Then she’d launched into a twenty-minute lecture “because I’m concerned about you, Tracy Ann.” It had been a bone of contention between them for awhile, Tracy’s relationship with Brendan.
    It didn’t seem to matter that he had been there for the past couple of years, standing next to her, her mother still refused to accept him as anything other than a mistake. There were moments—that Tracy kept trying to shove to the back of her mind—when she wondered whether her mother was actually . . . envious. Especially given her mother’s own difficult history, and her lifelong conviction that men like Brendan, good men, were in fact just too good to be true.
    There had only been one trip out to Atlanta as a couple, for Thanksgiving. A misguided mission if there ever was one. Tracy had booked her and Brendan a suite at the Sheraton near her mother’s house, knowing full well that her mother would have an issue with them sharing a bedroom, as though she was some bastion of morality. She didn’t tell Brendan why, but he went along with it because she’d insisted.
    On Thanksgiving morning, they’d headed over to the house where Brendan had almost immediately gotten in good with Tracy’s uncles and male cousins, and with more than a few of the women as well. That was the thing, everyone loved Brendan.
    How could they not? Tracy thought, watching him now as he stood at his mother’s stove, hand on her shoulder, leaning over and pretending to be impatient as she cooked him scrambled eggs.
    But all Thanksgiving Day, her mother had remained sour-faced and truculent with him, barely managing to respond to his overtures. And he kept making them, tirelessly trying to break through her mother’s icy demeanor.
    Finally, at the end of the day, Tracy had cornered her privately. The least you could do is make an effort with him!
    I don’t know what you mean , her mother returned. He’s in my home, isn’t he? Sitting down to dinner with our family? That is very much an effort on my part, I assure you .
    Why? Tracy demanded. What is it about him that gets to you like this?
    Her mother hadn’t been able to produce a response; and so Tracy had waited only another half hour before telling Brendan it was time for them to leave.
    He’d been in the middle of watching a football game with the men and looked confused about why they would head back to the hotel so soon after the meal, especially since they’d flown all the way from New York for the occasion. But he’d asked no questions, and pleasantly thanked everyone.
    On the ride back to the hotel, when Tracy started to cry silent tears he somehow knew not to ask why, but had simply reached over and grabbed onto her hand. At that, Tracy had leaned into him even while he was driving, hugging his arm, her head on his shoulder. They never talked about it, but she never suggested they go visit her mother again, and he didn’t ask why. That evening in the hotel room, to cheer her up, Brendan ordered three desserts and a bottle of champagne from room service, then gave her a full-body massage that, not unexpectedly, turned into more.
    Just thinking about that evening still gave her chills. Brendan had taken even her toes in his mouth . . . Tracy shifted in her seat, blushing as though Mr. and Mrs. Cole could read her unchaste thoughts about their son.
    No, her mother would never understand—but almost no one would—what he meant to her, and what Brendan did. He transformed occasions and things that were ugly, and unpleasant and difficult into something clean, and new and precious. What she felt for him  she couldn’t even explain; it both healed and hurt her heart.
    Sometimes being with Brendan felt like those dreams everyone gets, of falling off someplace really high up, dreading the moment when you would come crashing to the ground. Tracy