Mrs. Avery

Chapter 34

"MOM!" Liam came storming over and tried to wrap himself around her.

"Hey, you're late tonight. I've got dinner on. And whenever you have a sec can you help Juli with her English homework. She said you know what this TACC writing thing is. I have no idea what it is." He said turning back to the pot on the stove.

The TV was droning.

"It's the same thing as yesterday. Dad is bad at it."

"Mom, mom!" Liam clamored at her.

She was already crumbling. She felt like she was in some kind of tunnel.

"What baby?" She said wrapping her arms around him but her voice broke and James heard it. Liam immediately calmed himself and hugged her back.

"Mom, are you okay?" He said quietly.

And her steeled up resolve shattered.

"Yeah, baby." But her voice and her face betrayed her, slowly followed by her eyes.

James dropped what he was doing and rushed over to them. She slowly stood up straight from hugging Liam. James laid a hand on her shoulder. She retracted immediately.

"I can't... I just can't."

He stepped closer anyway and Liam slowly removed himself.

"I'm sorry." She said quietly as he got closer still. He had seen her like this one time before and he felt certain he knew what to do. He reached out slowly to her.

"Agnes, you're fine."

She buried her face in her hands and he wrapped his arms around her. "I don't want them to see me like this." she said quietly.

"Okay. Why don't you go upstairs then? We can talk to them later about everything alright? I got tonight."

She nodded her head against his. And he slowly released his hold on her. She backed up toward the stairs and then stopped. She looked at the kids. Liam only a few feet away, clearly confused and Julianna at the table just as dumbfounded.

Agnes pulled herself together as best she could and walked over to Liam. She kissed him on the head and then moved on to Julianna while saying. "I'm sorry guys. I'm just having a really bad day, okay." She kissed Julianna on the head and then retreated to her room.

"Is mom gonna be okay?"

"Yeah guys. She just needs a little break." He paused. "I've got an idea too."

He went to the dryer and pulled out a large sweatshirt still warm. He went upstairs into her room and started rifling through her drawers in the dark until he found red pajama bottoms.

"What are you doing?" She groaned. She was wrapped around a pillow on top of the bed covers. He took the sweatshirt and the pajama bottoms to her.

"Hey you." He said pulling her up by her arm.

She sat up and put her hands over her face. "Put these on and I'll leave you be, okay. You never feel good sleeping in your day clothes and you know it."

She didn't resist. She quietly changed. James didn't think to turn until she started stripping to her underwear. It then occurred to him that if they were going to open the door for Evan to be a part of this family, then he needed to respect their relationship. And something about letting his head trigger all the times he'd seen her naked, didn't seem like he was respecting much of anything.

"It's nothing you haven't seen before." She said quietly and matter-of-factly slipping the pjs on and then the sweatshirt.

"I was trying to be respectful." He turned back around and pulled back the covers on the bed.