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apartment.
    â€œYou were a little hard on her, weren’t you?” Sean said when he saw that Hilary had finished.
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œYou didn’t need to be so defensive with her.”
    â€œI wasn’t defensive,” she snapped, unwilling to admit she probably had been. “You don’t understand,” she added, pleading with him. “My mother wants to dictate my life.”
    Sean continued to clear off the kitchen table, stacking the chips in a round container. “I guess you’re right. My own mother died when I was small—I barely remember her.”
    â€œDid your father remarry?”
    Sean nodded. “I never got along much with my stepmother.”
    â€œShe smothers me with her love.”
    Sean’s lips thinned slightly and he nodded, but Hilary could sense his censure. He didn’t understand. He couldn’t. He didn’t have a clue as to how oppressed she’d felt the last couple of years.
    He slipped the deck of cards into the slot in the chip holder. “About the poker game—”
    â€œYes,” she broke in, hands on her hips. “Let’s talk about you bringing complete strangers into my home.”
    His jaw muscles tightened. “Are you looking for an argument, Hilary? Because I’ll be happy to give you one.”
    She deflated her chest and slowly shook her head. They had made the first steps toward friendship, and she didn’t want to crush that.
    Sean sighed and shook his head. “You’re right. I probably shouldn’t have invited my buddies over, but I didn’t figure it was any big deal.”
    â€œIt wasn’t,” she admitted slowly.
    He cocked his head slightly to one angle as if he wasn’t sure he’d heard her correctly. “I should have cleared it with you first.”
    â€œI shouldn’t have made such a fuss,” she whispered, her voice wobbling. Exhausted to the core, Hilary walked over to a wall calendar and flipped to the following month.
    â€œHil, what’s wrong?” How gentle he sounded, how concerned.
    She turned away from the kitchen wall and gestured weakly with her hands. “We’re in deep yogurt, Sean. My mother’s decided to come visit.”
    Sean’s brow condensed into thick lines. “When?”
    â€œMother’s Day.”
    â€œNo sweat,” he said with what sounded like supreme confidence. He marched past her and examined the calendar, counting out the weeks until the holiday. His index finger stopped dead on the second Sunday in May.
    â€œThe Greers won’t be back until the following week,’ he murmured thoughtfully.
    â€œI know.”
    â€œIt’s no big thing. I’ll pack up my things and get a hotel room for the weekend. I might even be able to stay with Craig for a couple of days. He’s another friend of mine. The guy wearing the baseball cap.”
    Hilary remembered Sean’s friend as the one who whistled using two fingers when Sean announced she was his roommate. “You’d be willing to do that?” His offer surprised her even more than the efficient way in which he’d ushered his friends out of the apartment.
    â€œOf course.”
    â€œI…I don’t know what to say.” It wasn’t so much that he’d be willing to find somewhere else to stay for the weekend, but that he’d take the time and effort to remove every bit of evidence of his presence in the apartment. It was one thing to stay away a few nights and another to literally move out.
    â€œShe won’t know I was ever here,” Sean promised.
    Hilary was overcome with gratitude. She mumbled her appreciation and then wandered aimlessly to her room. After she’d showered and changed clothes, she returned to the kitchen to find Sean straightening up the kitchen. Most of the food had been put away, and he’d swept the floor.
    â€œI…I hope I didn’t embarrass you in