Page 56 of The Roommate Problem
“My parents are kind of…” She wrinkled her nose. “Hippies? I guess that’s the best term to describe them.”
Now that he could believe, seeing as who their daughter was.
“They never felt the need to cement their love for each other with a piece of paper. But they’ve been living together for decades, so by now they’re common law married anyway.”
“And they’ve never separated? In all that time?” What was holding them together? He knew a marriage license wasn’t set in stone, but it kept his parents together long after they should have separated. How did two people stay with each other for so long if they weren’t legally bound to each other?
“No. They love each other.” Mo stared at him as if he had two heads. “They’re soul mates. Why would they ever leave each other?”
He shrugged. “Married people get divorced all the time. Even when they claim to be soul mates.”
What a silly word. What did it even mean? No one really knew what a soul was, so how could it have a mate? Never made sense to him.
Mo’s teeth came out to worry her bottom lip. Her eyes soft, she asked, “Is that what happened to your parents? They got divorced?”
He shrugged. “Yeah.” Not like he was the only kid in the world to have parents who split. “It’s not a big deal.”
She placed her hand on top of his, squeezing gently. “I think it is. How old were you when it happened?”
“Ten.” He used his free hand to reach into the bag and grab some popcorn. Not because he was hungry, but because he needed something else to focus on while he told this story. “They’d been fighting for years, so it was more of a relief. For them anyway.”
“Oh, August, I’m sorry.”
He shrugged off her sympathy. He didn’t need it. It happened a long time ago. He was over it.
“It was a pretty amicable divorce.” He tossed a few kernels in his mouth, chewed, and swallowed. “I spent half the week with Mom, the other half with Dad. A few weeks in the summer with Gran.”
Those had been the best weeks of the year, his one-on-one time with Gran.
“You home hopped?” Her jaw dropped open in shock. “That must have been so hard for you. And your parents.”
“I was fine,” he lied. “Besides, they both got remarried within a year, and their spouses already had kids with full custody, so they had their core family and an extra kid every few days of the week.”
Suddenly, the popcorn bag was tossed onto the coffee table, and August had an armful of Mo. She wrapped her arms around his neck, hugging him tightly, her face buried in his neck.
“You’re not an extra, August.” She sniffled. “You’re a person who matters. If your parents ever made you feel like a spare or superfluous, that’s on them. And quite frankly makes them bad parents. No child should ever feel unwanted.”
He wouldn’t say he felt unwanted as a kid. Second fiddle to his stepsiblings was more the feeling he got. Dampness hit his skin. He tugged softly, pulling Mo from his arms to see a few tears running down her cheeks.
“Hey,” he said, brushing away her tears with his thumbs. “What’s all this?”
Was she crying for him? No one had ever cried for him. He wasn’t sure how to feel about it. He didn’t need her tears. He’d been out of his parents’ houses for a long time now. And it wasn’t as if they were abusive or anything, just sort of wrapped up in their lives and new families. He wasn’t neglected so much as…forgettable. A second thought to their primary families.
“Don’t cry, Sunshine.” He bent his head, placing a kiss to her lips. “I’m fine.”
The tears stopped, but she shook her head. “You’re not fine. How could any child be fine after being sent back and forth between homes like a gravy boat?”
Gravy boat?Weird analogy. It wasn’t like his parents didn’t want him at their new homes or resented him or anything. They just kind of…didn’t know how to fit him in their new lives.
“It wasn’t that bad.” He tucked her into his side, finding it kind of hilarious that he was trying to comfort her about his crappy childhood. “They provided for me. I never lacked anything.”
“Except love,” she interrupted.
He shifted on the couch. “They loved me.” In their own way. “I was just left out of a lot of family decisions since I lived at each home part-time.”
“That had to be hard for you.”
He lifted a shoulder. “I got used to it. Ended up making a lot of my own plans.”
