She bit her lip, watching me. “I know you are. I know you are trying to do the best you can.”

Apparently my best wasn’t good enough. Not really. I looked down, avoided her eyes, hoped she’d drop the subject of my moving in with Adam.

She didn’t say anything for a long time. Then, as if for lack of anything better to do, she turned and scooped up my socks and started stuffing them into my top drawer—where there was not much room for them. I rubbed my forehead.

“So, you won’t even consider it, then?” she finally asked.

“Why do you think it’s such a good idea?” I folded my arms over my chest. Best way to avoid a difficult question was to ask another question. But I also knew that she was no stranger to this tactic.

She looked at me through narrowed eyes. “Because you can’t do this alone. I know you. I know you want to do everything by yourself. God knows what a frustrating experience it has been to be your mother and to have to deal with that stubbornness. You used to insist on tying your own shoes even when you didn’t know how. Then you’d trip until you skinned your knees bloody before you’d let anyone help you tie them. But it’s one thing when you are six. It’s quite another thing to face the medical treatments you have ahead of you with no help at all.”

“But I have Heath…” And even as I said it, I knew that she was right—it wasn’t fair. Mom caught it pretty quickly.

“You’ve already put a hefty burden on his shoulders, Mia. Sometimes I think he’s about to crack from it. You need to give him a break. And you need to give him a chance to be able to spend some time with his new boyfriend and not play nursemaid for you.”

I sighed. “You’ve made good points. I’ll, um, I’ll think about it, okay?”

Her eyes narrowed. “I can’t leave until I know you are going to be taken care of properly, since I won’t be able to do it myself. You can call me at Peter’s when you’ve made your decision.”

“But Mom, what if Rusty goes into labor—”

Mom gave a tight shrug and that’s when I knew that she meant business. “Horses have been giving birth in the wild for thousands of years.”

My jaw dropped. “Mom…”

Her brows rose. “You got that stubbornness from somewhere, kid. Don’t even try it.”

I put my head down and rubbed my forehead. Inexplicably, tears stung my eyes—tears that would never slip down my cheeks. I blinked fiercely… I wouldn’t allow it.

“What are you afraid of, Mia?”

I sucked down a breath of air and shook my head, shrugging. “Blowing it again? Because even if we didn’t ruin everything, it’s all hanging by a thread.”

“You’ve been through a lot in a short amount of time.”

“It’s all like a blur,” I murmured, blinking my eyes. My vision seemed a metaphor for my life. “It’s like one moment everything was going great. Wonderful. All these pieces were falling into place and then…”

“And then?”

“Is he just with me because I’m sick—because of everything that’s happened?”

My mom patted the bed beside her and I looked up. She nodded reassuringly and I stood up and went to sit next to her. She slipped an arm around my shoulders. “I’m going to tell you the truth. I don’t know. You don’t know. Heath doesn’t know. The only one who knows? You need to ask him those questions.”

I didn’t say anything for a while, watching the spotted carpet beneath our feet.

“How about you? Are you just with him because you’re sick? Because of everything?”

There were those feelings again, the jumbled ball of heaviness at the center of my chest. It was hard to breathe. I didn’t want to talk about this with her. I shook my head. I supposed if I sat down for a few hours and thought about nothing else, unraveled this ball like it was a tangled spool of yarn ends and examined each piece, I might be able to tell her what every nuance and twinge meant—love, hurt, longing, distance, loneliness, distrust, regret, guilt. They were all there and all bunched up in knots. And my heart was tender and vulnerable for it.

“I’m afraid if I go there, if we live together, that it will ultimately be what makes us fail.”

“Or, it could be what makes you stronger. Maybe you should believe in yourself more.”

I put my head in my hands. “Why do I have to deal with this now?”

“You don’t have to do anything but let the people who love you take care of you. Your job right now is to get better. Okay?”