“Be nice to have him around for a while,” Katie said.
“I can’t wait.” After glancing around the diner, Paige pulled her order pad out of her apron pocket. “You guys know what you want? Gavin whipped up some amazing baked mac-and-cheese for the dinner special last night and, trust me, it’s even better reheated.”
Gavin hoped to go to culinary school someday and Paige let him try out new recipes on the diner’s customers, provided the ingredients weren’t too expensive and tofu wasn’t on the list. Josh had liked some dishes more than others, but taking a chance on the kid rarely steered him wrong.
“I’ll give it a try,” he said. “With a coffee.”
“Ditto,” Katie said.
When Paige brought their drinks and went to see to the other diners, Josh leaned forward. “So, I’ve been wanting to ask you something. It’s probably personal, but…it’s kind of relevant to me. Maybe.”
Katie gave him a look he couldn’t quite decipher, but after a few seconds, she shrugged. “Ask. I’ll either answer or I won’t, as usual.”
“It’s about Andy, actually.” He saw her expression change. It was subtle—her mouth tightened and her eyes narrowed just a little—but it was obvious she knew more about Andy’s story than she’d let on before. “What’s the deal there?”
“The deal is that he pissed her off a long time ago, but she forgave him and now they’re actually friends.”
“Gee, I couldn’t figure that out from the fact she didn’t talk to him for like thirty years and then she forgave him and now she’s knitting him a Christmas present.”
“Then why’d you ask?”
His least favorite Katie Davis trait. If she didn’t want to talk about something, she’d be a pain in the ass and annoy him to the point he didn’t give a crap anymore. “Don’t be a smart-ass. What did he do to piss her off?”
“Why don’t you ask her?”
“Because I don’t think she’ll tell me.”
“Then she probably doesn’t want you to know.” She took a long sip of coffee, looking at him over the rim.
“Come on. You know how much I love your mom, and the guy’s in and out of my house all the freaking time now. It bugs the shit out of me not knowing.”
“When I was little, Andy and my dad went on a sledding trip. They grabbed dinner at a bar and Andy chatted up a woman and got her to go back to the motel with them. She had a friend and my dad cheated on Mom. She blamed Andy.”
He sat back against the booth. “Holy shit.”
“Yeah. She told me blaming Andy made it easier to forgive Dad.” She was turning her coffee mug around and around on the table, staring down into the swirling liquid. “I never knew. She didn’t tell me until you and Mitch hired Andy to work at the lodge and I asked her straight out.”
Josh felt a slow burn of anger, but it was pointless. Earle Davis had been dead fourteen years. “You okay with Andy being around, because if you’re not—”
She held up her hand. “I’m fine. I mean, yeah, if Andy hadn’t hooked up with that woman, Dad might never have cheated on Mom, but nobody held a gun to my dad’s head. It was his decision. And Andy lost his best friend out of it because he and my dad stopped hanging out after that.”
“I had no idea it was that bad. I always thought it was probably something stupid or funny, like him saying her meat loaf sucked or something, and they were both too stubborn to get over it.”
“Nope. Not stupid or funny.”
Paige showed up then with their meals, giving Josh a couple of minutes to digest what he’d heard. In a town like Whitford, the fact it wasn’t common knowledge Earle had stepped out on his wife was nothing short of a miracle. And even if he could remember back that far, Josh probably never would have guessed Rosie’s marriage had almost come undone. She was more a stiff upper lip in front of the kids and cry in the shower kind of woman.
“You let me know if you want to move the Christmas Eve party to my house,” Paige said, stopping to refill their coffees.
Oh, damn. He kept forgetting about that stupid party. If he had his way, the whole thing would be cancelled. Or postponed until April or May, maybe. “She gave Thanksgiving over to you, but I don’t see her giving up Christmas Eve at the lodge.”
“Mom’s a smart woman,” Katie said. “She’ll understand there’s only so much we can do and she’s sick and Paige has plenty of room for everybody. She’ll be reasonable.”
*
“We’re having Christmas Eve at the Northern Star and that’s the end of it.”
Katie looked at her mother reclined against her pillows with her arms folded across her chest, and swore. But only in her mind, of course. She wondered what the chances were of flagging down a nurse and getting a sedative. For her, for her mom. Either worked.