Chapter Forty-Two

Mason

I can feel her eyes on me as I stare down at my plate, pushing my food around. I hadn’t planned to stay for dinner. I just wanted to drop Emmet off at home for the weekend and then beat a hasty retreat back to my place. But Mom wouldn’t hear of it. With Dad off on a shoot in Canada, she practically begged me to stay for a while. Next to me, my brother is carefully arranging the peas on his plate in descending order by size.

“Mason, have you heard anything from Walker?” she asks gently.

“Nope.”

It’s the only response I can muster. I just don’t have it in me to expound on the topic any more than that. I’ve been furious, I’ve been heartbroken, and now I’m just numb as the reality settles in. I had a good thing and I blew it. No one’s fault here but my own. Not that Lydia plans to let it go anytime soon.

“How are you feeling, son?”

“Fine.”

I hear her let out a long, resigned sigh. “You don’t look very fine at all,” she observes. When I don’t reply, she tries again. “Have you tried—”

“I’ve tried everything,” I snap, meeting her eyes. “Calling, texting, flowers, balloons. I’ve begged, I’ve cajoled, I’ve reasoned. But she won’t budge, Mom. And I can’t spend the rest of my life chasing someone who doesn’t want me.”

My mother is quiet for a long moment, folding her hands on the table in front of her dinner plate.

“You really love her.” It’s a statement, not a question.

I level a withering glare on her. Rarely do I ever get genuinely angry with my mother, but I’m getting close. This is one bear she’s poking a little too hard for her own good. If she’s not careful, I might just snap her head off.

“Mom, can we please just…not?”

She sits back in her chair, folds her arms across her chest, and quirks an eyebrow. I know that look, and I don’t like it one bit. She’s having an epiphany.

“Okay, so…I’m sorry I doubted Walker in the first place, son. I truly am. And, if I thought it would help, I’d—”

“Don’t you dare contact her!” I hiss, waving my fork in her direction.

She holds up her hands in a gesture of surrender.

“I won’t. I’m not planning on it. I’m just so sorry. I feel responsible, Mason. That day when we met for lunch at the pub, I got there early to have a talk with her. With Walker…”

I’m on my feet so quickly and with so much force that the chair slides out from under me, gliding a few feet from the table.

“You did what? What’d you say?” I demand.

If she’s at all threatened by my menacing demeanor, she doesn’t show it.

“Just that she should give some real thought as to whether or not she and, by extension, her family, were suited to deal with the kind of attention that our family sometimes gets.”

I’m shaking my head incredulously as my palm goes to my forehead.

“Jesus. Please, tell me you’re kidding…”

“I’m not. But, Mason, I see now,” she begins, her voice notching up just a bit in volume and intensity. “I see what you see in Walker…and I’m so sorry I ever doubted her…”

“Oh God, Mom,” I groan. This is a freakin’ nightmare. No wonder Walker is done with me.

“Son, you have to formulate a plan to get her back…”

“Get her back?” I spit. “Get. Her. Back? No offense, Mother, but you’re a couple sandwiches short of a picnic if you think there’s anything I can possibly do to get her back now.” I return the chair to the table and slump down into it miserably.

“Mason, look at me,” she says in an unexpectedly severe voice. I do. She’s got her hands on her hips and she’s tilting her head to one side, as if she’s summing me up.

“What?” I ask, sounding more whiny than angry now. “What do you want?”

“I want you to stop feeling sorry for yourself and do something about this mess. There’s always another play to be made, son. And, if you really love her, you’ll do what needs to be done.”

“Like what? I just told you, I’ve tried everything.”

“You didn’t try a grand gesture.”

“A what?”

“A grand gesture. Something big and romantic that gets the girl’s attention and shows her that you really care about her. That you’d fight for her.”

“It’s no use, Mom…”

“Emmet, do you mind if your brother and I go downstairs for a while?” she asks my brother who’s still busy arranging his peas in size order.

“No. I’m almost done here anyway. I’m going to go upstairs and work on my computer.”

“Okay, son,” she says to Emmet, “let me know if you need anything.” Then she turns in my direction. “Come with me,” she demands, getting to her feet and beckoning me to follow her.

We head toward the basement and its media room where she walks along the wall that’s lined with DVDs from floor to ceiling. She runs her index finger along the spines, stopping occasionally to pull one out. Finally satisfied, she brings the small stack to the DVD unit and gestures for me to have a seat in one of the overstuffed leather loungers. She sets up the first disc, then drops into the seat next to mine with the remote in hand.

“Mom, really I am so not in the mood for a movie…”

But she’s not having it.

“This is not for your entertainment, Mason. This is for your education.”

“Education on what?”

“On romance.”

I think I’ve misheard her.

“What?”

“Romance.”

“You’re not…we’re not going to watch…you know…porn, are we?” I ask, so horrified that I can barely get the question out.

Her response is equally incredulous, but in the other direction.

“What? Porn! Mason, really!”

“Well, I don’t know what you’re talking about…romance…and all that…” I protest, flustered.

She rolls her eyes. “Good Lord. I have failed you as a parent. All right,” she says, putting a hand on my arm, “there are several distinguishable parts of a romance. A book, a movie, a play, whatever. The meet-cute…”

“The what?” I can’t help but snort with amusement.

“Meet-cute. Where the two main characters meet. You and Walker at the pub that night you were stranded, right?”

“I guess…”

“Then there’s conflict—why the two can’t be together. You’ve got a few of those. You weren’t honest with her at first. She doesn’t trust you. The kind of scrutiny that sometimes spills over into your lifestyle…”

Oh yeah, we’ve had conflict o’ plenty.

When I don’t interrupt her, she continues. “Then there’s the dark moment. When all is lost.”

Now she’s got my attention. This really does all line up.

“Like when she thought I was still seeing Cassandra and didn’t want to see me anymore,” I murmur.

Mom nods enthusiastically now that I appear to be getting it.

“Exactly. But here’s the thing, honey. Every romance—every true romance—which isn’t necessarily the same thing as a love story—has an H-E-A.”

“A what?”

“Happily ever after.” She snatches up my hand, holding it tight in both of hers and giving it a squeeze. “I think that you and Walker might just have a real romance. And there’s only one way to get past the dark moment in a real romance…”

“What? What is it?” I ask, breathless.

Why hadn’t she told me before? She’s had the key all this time and she’s been hiding it?

Mom smiles at me knowingly. “A grand gesture.”

I stare at her blankly. “A what?”

“You go after her with a grand gesture. Something big to woo her back to you.”

“But I’ve already done that. I sent flowers, a balloon bouquet…”

She’s shaking her head. “No, son. Grand gesture. Not some token delivered by a third party. It has to come from you, and it has to come from your heart. It has to be something that speaks to her heart.”

I pull my hands from hers so I can throw them up in frustration.

“What? Mom, I have no freaking idea what you’re talking about.”

She smiles and pats my leg. “I know, honey, but you’re about to.”

…

I had no idea. Not a clue. But I do now.

Richard Gere scaling the fire escape for Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman. Meg Ryan waiting for Tom Hanks on the Empire State Building in Sleepless in Seattle. John Cusack holding up the boombox playing Peter Gabriel in Say Anything. We’ve spent the last five hours watching movie after movie, my mother pointing out the major beats from meet-cute to HEA.

Holy crap. What an education.

“Well,” she asks, pushing the button to raise the lights, “do you understand now?”

I shake my head dumbly.

“Do you love her, son? Like that?”

I nod dumbly.

“Then you have to go and get her.”

“But…what am I supposed to do? What kind of a grand gesture am I supposed to execute? I have no clue!”

She shrugs. “Then put your own spin on one of the ones we’ve just seen. I suspect if you go to her…you’ll know.”

“But I’ve been to her. And I haven’t known…”

“But it’s different now, Mason. Now you have the map for the road you’ve been on with her. And the only stops left are grand gesture and HEA. Otherwise it’s just…the end.”

In a split second I’m on my feet and taking the steps two at time.

My mother doesn’t ask where I’m going. She doesn’t have to.

“Go get her!” is the last thing I hear before I dash out of the house and to my car.