"I saw you at the ice cream shop the other day."
Jared met his mother's eyes across the table. They ate lunch together several times a week, a habit Jared enjoyed.
"And you didn't offer to buy me a cone?" he teased, flashing his smile.
They were at her favorite restaurant, a small English pub that served wonderful food in an intimate atmosphere. Even at midday, the lighting subdued, a single lamp cast an island of light around their table.
"You weren't alone," she said, concern evident in her eyes and her tone. But she didn't pry. His mother never did.
"Alex," Jared said, wondering exactly what he revealed in how he said the name. It was too familiar on his tongue. He tried to keep a grip on his feelings for Alex but was sinking a little deeper every day, his heart more entangled with each meeting. "It's nothing, Mom, just a kid I met a few weeks ago. I hang out with him and his friend sometimes. I wouldn't let it be anything else."
She didn't comment. Her eyes, the same blue as his, said it all. Jared took a bite of his baked potato, but it tasted like sawdust in his mouth. He didn't want to lie to his mother, silence was safer. She reached across the table to lay her hand on his arm, her touch as gentle and reassuring as when he was a boy.
"I know that, Jared. You are too good a man to do…" She stopped short, but it hung unspoken between them, 'to do what David did to you.'
It was something Jared tried to erase from his memory. The older man had taken him under his wing when Jared was sixteen, and under the guise of mentoring him, David encouraged Jared's budding sexuality. He said everything Alex wanted to hear from Jared. Words of love and promises he didn't mean. After the sacrificing of Jared's innocence, David disappeared.
"It's okay, Mom, I've dealt with it." Jared covered her hand with his, aware how rough his touch must feel on her soft skin. Construction wasn't a gentle way to earn a living. She smiled, staring at his hand.
"You have your father's hands," she said, "and his heart. Jared, I'm not worried that you'll do anything inappropriate or hurt that boy. I'm worried that you don't guard yourself as carefully as you do others. You are in love with him. Maybe no one else sees it, but I do. What will you do when he grows up?"
Holding her gaze, Jared gave her the only answer he could. The truth.
"I'll let him go."