Page 101 of Scoring Chances

“I got a date tonight.”

“You do?”

I nod. I bend down to pick up her luggage. “Jeez, what’d you pack in here? Oliver?”

She laughs. “He wishes.”

She gets in the car and buckles her seat belt. She looks over at me.

"James had a car like this too," she says.

"Yeah, Cole told me."

Her eyes are sad.

"I'm so sorry I never told you about him."

I look over at her briefly.

"He was my first love. And everything I shouldn't have wanted. James was a good man. He wasn't rich like some of the boys I had dated. Their dads were all doctors and lawyers. Top of their class, creme de la creme, you know. James was different. He was salt of the earth. Worked with his hands. Didn't mind getting dirty."

I smile. Imagining my biological father in this new light. Not the dark shadow I had cast over him my entire life.

"Anyway… when I found out I was pregnant with you. I panicked. I was supposed to be starting college in the fall. I was going to be a doctor. So of course, having a baby wasn't ideal. And I let my parent's convince me that having a baby with someone who didn't want to do anything but fix cars—that wouldn't do."

"So what did you do?"

"I never told him."

"Mom…"

"He never knew you were his son, Josh. And that… that was all my fault. Because I was too stubborn and too proud to let my son be raised by someone who didn't seem to be going anywhere. By the time I finished my degree, you were already eight. I had met Oliver. It was too late."

"I knew it was wrong… I knew I should've told him. Not because I needed anything from him but just because he had a right to know. And you had a right to know him."

I nod. Because what else am I going to do about this information. We're almost at the house now. I slowly drive up to the driveway and park the car.

She plays with her hands in her lap.

"There's more," she says.

I look at her.

"When he came to see me, before he passed. I thought I was seeing a ghost. I was being punished. I was so full of guilt that I told him I couldn't help him. And the look in his eyes haunts me to this day. That I would refuse to help someone that needed the very thing that I specialized in. I realized then… I needed to do better. I looked into him. And by the time I located him—it was too late. He had passed away. "

"Knowing he had passed just spurred something in me. Like I needed to make amends. For your sake. But when I arrived and saw those kids, Josh." She shakes her head. "Mirror images of the man I once loved. The man I had let down. It was like I was being taunted. Teased by the universe. I knew exactly who they were."

"You didn't say anything."

"How could I? Without telling you everything? And you were so distracted trying to play up the girlfriend charade. I figured… one day I'd tell you. It just wasn't the time."

I turn the car off. The street is quiet. The sun has set and I can see my nanny fixing the kids dinner through the window.

"Those kids are apart of my life now. I'm not letting them go."

She nods. "I know. That's why I needed to come. They don't have anyone but you. But you have family, Josh. You'll never be alone. They'll have grandparents that will love on them. And when the time comes and the right woman comes along, I know she'll blend in perfectly. She'll fit like a puzzle piece."

"I hope you can forgive some day, Josh. I don't expect you to do it. I'll just hope that you can. And that those kids that you love so dearly can too. Because in the end, family really is everything. Whether we're related by blood or not."