month, with Alex if he was willing, or without him if he wasn’t. He told them the attitude adjustment was theirs to make, and he was very clear about it. John sounded like someone had died. His fantasy son. The real one was alive and well and still needed his father and mother.
Olivia stayed home with Alex for another day, and then she invited him to come to the office with her. She had some meetings she had to attend. She knew John had taken the week off, so Alex wouldn’t run into him. Once he heard that, Alex went into town with her. And Phillip was surprised to see him in the office.
“How’s your dad? He’s been out all week.” Phillip had been told he was sick.
“I don’t know. I haven’t seen him,” Alex said bluntly. “I’m staying with Grandma.” That came as a surprise too. They were all full of surprises these days. He told Alex he had just left Amanda. Alex then told him he was gay and his father couldn’t deal with it, so he was staying at his grandmother’s, who was fine with it. Phillip looked shocked, and called his brother to discuss it. Basically, Phillip agreed with his mother and Liz. John had to find a way to accept it. He took Alex out to lunch after that. And by the end of the day, Alex was in decent spirits, and he was chatty all the way home to Bedford. And he went into town with Olivia the next day too. John called her in the office and said he and Sarah wanted to come out to Bedford on Saturday, and Olivia told him not to come unless he could be supportive of his son. The counselor had told him the same thing.
Sarah and John looked mournful when they arrived, but they were civil to their son. There were tears and recriminations and questions, but in the end John put his arms around him and told Alex he loved him. It was a major adjustment for them. And on Sunday, Olivia drove Alex back to Princeton. He said he would try going home and see how it worked out. But Olivia could see that John was trying. His acceptance wasn’t going to come overnight, but Alex had learned that his uncle and aunt and grandmother accepted him as he was, and his parents would have to get there in their own time. Alex was willing to live with that. He went back to school on Monday, and he called his grandmother every day. He told her that after two days in her office, he was more certain than ever that he wanted to work there one day.
“Then you’d better stay in school and go to college,” she told him, and he laughed. She hadn’t, but the business was far more sophisticated and complicated now.
“Yeah, I know,” he said. And he reported to her that his parents were doing better. They were trying. It was all she could ask for, and they’d gotten through it. It had strengthened her bond with her grandson. She was his defender, protector, and ally.
“Thanks, Grandma,” he said before he hung up. “For everything. I love you.”
“I love you too.” And she loved her son too, even if he had a long way to go to understand Alex and accept him as he was. It had been a lesson for all of them. And for John most of all, that things don’t always turn out as we expect or even hope. The only thing that mattered in the end was that he loved his son, and that Alex knew it.
Chapter 21
Phillip’s lawyer had very sensibly advised him that Taylor could spend nights with him, but it was smarter if she didn’t actually move in. With the benefits of no-fault divorce, Amanda couldn’t sue him for adultery, but there was no point annoying her unduly. Sooner or later she was going to find out about Taylor, and it was easy to guess that her fury over it, and jealousy, were going to cost him. The fact that he was moving on with his life so quickly, and that Taylor was sixteen years younger than Amanda, was bound to cause some pretty severe waves. So Taylor kept her room at the apartment in the Village, but she spent almost every night with him.
He found a furnished apartment on upper Park Avenue, which was sunny and pleasant, and by mid-October he had moved