Thank God it was Raf.  My youngest would have taken a swing at a shirtless man in my kitchen, whereas Raf seemed to be chatting him up.  He was not one to swing first and ask questions later.  That wasn’t to say he wasn’t every bit as protective of me as his brother.  He was just more levelheaded.

He was more likely to ask the questions, and then swing if he didn’t like the answers.

I approached the two men tentatively, wondering if it would do more or less damage if I ran back into my room to put on more than a robe.

The opportunity was lost to me as both of them noticed me right away.

Raf grinned at me, and Heath turned back to the coffeepot and began to make me a cup.  He prepped it just the way I liked, though I couldn’t remember why he should know that.

“Good morning, Mom,” Raf said.

“Morning,” rumbled Heath, his voice sounding gravelly and unused, as it usually did, no matter how much he used it.

I hugged my son briefly, took the perfectly tailored cup of coffee that Heath handed me, murmured a quiet, “Thank you” to him, and leaned against the counter about two feet from Heath and across from Raf.

My gaze moved back and forth as the two of them continued chatting as though all of this was perfectly normal.

It was not.  Inside, I was freaking the hell out.

Did this make me a horrible mother?

And, how horrible of a mother did this make me?

But then I remembered how old Raf was, and observed how well he seemed to be taking it all, and I felt worlds better.

But then I remembered how old Heath was (not much older than Raf!) and went back to freaking the hell out.

Oh my God.  What was I doing?  And why did they both seem to think this was way more normal than it was?  And . . .

Were they actually getting along?

Hitting it off?

Never in a million years would I have imagined this could go down the way it did.  But it only did for two simple reasons.

Raf.

And Heath.

It was like they wanted to get along even more than I wanted it.

I started blinking rapidly as I realized why this was.  Heart melting for both of them.

They did want it more.  And the reason was simple.  Me.  They wanted it more for me.

How wonderful was that?

And that was the moment I was sure that Heath cared about me.  Not just wanted me.  Cared about me.  About what would trouble me, and what would make me happy.  And he knew me well enough, apparently, to know how to handle this specifically awkward situation.

I’m not sure I can describe it, but it was endearing as almost nothing else could have been, and in a way that could only pave its way straight to my heart.

The way Heath, this gruff man of few words, bent over backwards to be respectful of me, and to me, to my son.

Sincerity fairly oozed off him as he tried his best to portray to my son that, while it was obvious he had spent the night at my house, he was there, not for some sleazy reason, but because he cared about me.

Heath glanced over at me, and his whole hard face softened as he caught what must have been a smitten, dazed look on my face.

He took a deep breath and moved to me.

“Hey,” Heath said, cupping the back of my head and giving me some intense eye contact.  “I need to get ready to go work for a few hours, but I’ll be back in time to go to the grocery store with you.”

Whatever that meant, I thought.

He kissed me lightly on the forehead and went back to my bedroom to get dressed.

After he was gone, I faced my son as squarely as I could, tried to make eye contact, but couldn’t stop a grimace.  “Busted,” I said with a sigh.

He laughed, and a weight lifted off my shoulders.  I’d been worried that, I don’t know, I guess that my dating again would somehow affect my sons badly.  Like it would damage them somehow.  But Raf did not seem at all damaged.  I couldn’t have been more relieved.

“So . . . you’re actually okay with this?”  My tone was hopeful.

“To tell you the truth, when he answered your door at that hour of the morning and everything, wearing what he was wearing, my first gut instinct was, well, I was a bit appalled about the whole thing.  It’s sort of a worst nightmare of mine, you . . . hooking up with one of my old classmates or whatever.”

I just stared at him.  I had no idea what he was talking about.

“I’m sure you noticed,” he continued, “but in high school, and even in college, we’ve had some friends who were pretty f—”, he corrected mid-word, “freaking obsessed with you and things would slip, they’d say stuff about you.  Well, we got in some fights.”

I had noticed, in a vague kind of way, how weird all of his friends were around me, how awkward, and I wasn’t stupid or oblivious, and they were teenage boys, so it was easy to figure out why they were being weird and awkward, but I hadn’t known that it bothered my boys so much.

And I did remember the fights.  I’d hated it when they got in fights.  Seeing cuts and bruises on them was a special kind of torture for me.  It literally made me feel faint when I thought of either of my children being physically harmed.  My reaction to seeing their blood had always been extreme.

“But anyway,” Raf continued, “he’s not an old or current classmate, so that’s not really the issue.  He’s just young . . . and a little strange, with all the scars on his chest . . . But who the hell cares?  He obviously cares about you.  And, well, Dad was a bastard to you, and you deserve so much better.  You deserve to have whoever the hell you want, and you get to pick who that is.  So if you’re happy, we’re happy.