“Good,” Mitch muttered again then he lifted a hand, curled it around Billy’s neck and he pulled him even closer to his face. And when he got him close, his face changed in a way I understood immediately and I prayed Billy, who didn’t miss anything, understood it too.
But he didn’t have to.
Because Mitch laid it out.
“I love you, Bud,” he whispered to Billy and two more tears escaped.
“I love you too, Mitch,” Billy whispered back, my breath hitched and both males’ eyes came to me.
I waved my wineglass at them and murmured, “Don’t mind me. Have your moment.”
Mitch leaned back, letting Billy go and grinning at me. “Men don’t have moments.”
“You do,” I returned. “I’m witnessing one.”
“This isn’t a moment, honey, it’s a meeting of the minds,” Mitch contradicted me.
“It’s a moment, Mitch,” I contradicted him.
Mitch transferred his grin to Billy and asked, “Are we having a moment?”
Billy stared up at Mitch then he looked at me.
Then he answered, “Nope.”
Billy didn’t even know what a moment was. He was just agreeing with Mitch because Mitch was a guy and I was a girl who was crying.
I rolled my eyes, gave his hand another squeeze, let it go and then swiped at the wet on my face, muttering, “Whatever.”
When I quit swiping, I looked back at my boys to see them sharing a smile.
Witnessing that, it took some effort but only one more tear escaped rather than me bursting into thousands of them and I succeeded in this endeavor by doing what any girl would do to succeed in this endeavor. I sucked back more wine.
“Right. That’s done, bedtime,” Mitch decreed, lifting his legs off the coffee table so Billy could get through.
Billy jumped up and rounded the couch while Mitch and I watched him go.
He stopped halfway to the mouth of the hall and turned back to Mitch.
“Thanks for today, Mitch, it was fun.”
“We’ll do it again, Bud,” Mitch replied. “Now hit the sack. Yeah?”
Billy nodded. “Yeah. ’Night, Mitch,” he muttered, looked at me and called, “’Night, Auntie Mara.”
“Goodnight, honey,” I called back.
Billy resumed moving to his room. I looked at Mitch mostly because he’d leaned into me and shoved an arm between me and the couch. He was pulling me into him and I was concentrating on not spilling any wine as he executed this maneuver.
I succeeded and was settling into my man to relax with him, wine and candles when we heard, “Auntie Mara?”
Mitch and I both twisted our necks to look over the back of the couch. When we did, we saw Billy standing just outside the shadows at the mouth of the hall.
“Yeah, honey?” I called back.
Billy held my eyes.
Then he announced, “Billie looks like you.”