She sniffles and wipes her nose with the back of her hand. “It shouldn’t be.”

We keep our heads connected, and we talk. For basically the first time in our lives, we talk for real. I like feeling the vibration of her words inside my ears. I tell her about how Grandpa died, and she shuts her eyes and nods as she takes this information in. For the first time in my life, I can feel my mom’s love for my dad. I feel it in my scalp, this palpable love, despite everything, that she has for him.

That feeling is confirmed when she tells me it’s been hard to be back here, but she’s realized that she still cares for Dad, all this time later. Part of me lights up when she tells me this, because it’s the missing puzzle piece, and it flickers brighter.

I tell her about all the people we met on our trip, and all the adventures. She pulls away a bit, and I remember that while Aisha and I were doing all that, I was actively ignoring her.

“Mom,” I say. “It’s okay, really.”

“What’s okay?”

“That you’re pissed at me. I’d be pissed at me too.”

I feel her nod. “I am … pissed.”

I lift my head off hers and look her in the eye.

“If you have to, like, yell at me, you should yell at me,” I say.

“You want me to yell at you?” she asks, like she’s not sure if I mean it.

“I want you to yell sometimes. When I screw up.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah.”

She mock-screams, “No! I won’t yell at you!”

For the first time, I realize my dad is not my only parent with a weird sense of humor. This makes me smile. She smiles just a bit too.

“You’re grounded, by the way,” she says. “Incredibly, outrageously grounded. Possibly for eternity. And if you ever, for any reason, even a very good one, leave the state you’re supposed to be in without telling me, I will come find you and make you sorry you ever lived.”

“Maybe pull back on the yelling a tad,” I say.

She smiles again, and my whole body relaxes. My mom.

When Aisha comes back upstairs, my mom and I are still hanging out, chatting. I can see Aisha take in that something has happened here, and then she just goes with it, pretends that it’s not unusual for Mom and me to talk like we’re actually inhabiting the same world. Turk and my dad are still in the bedroom, and I am anxious for them to come out so I can see how Dad is doing with all this.

Aisha and Mom talk for really the first time ever too, and I get to see a different side of my mom. She’s still her psychologist self; I mean, I guess I’d be surprised if she ever lost that therapist tone. But she also opens up a bit about how scared she felt when she didn’t know where I was, and at the same time how glad she was to know I had Aisha there with me.

“You’re more than welcome to stay here as long as we’re here,” my mother says. “I know how important you are to Carson, and that’s meaningful to me.”

I roll my eyes and say to Aisha, “We want you to locate yourself here.”

My mom narrows her eyes at me.

“Too soon?” I ask.

“Much too soon,” my mother says.

“Be nice to your mom,” Aisha says.

“Sorry.”

I crawl over and kiss my mom on the cheek, and she cups my chin in her hands.

“Apology accepted,” she says.

I hear the door to my father’s bedroom creak open. Dad and Turk emerge slowly. My mom and I stand up. Dad looks small. He stares at the ground, emotionless.

“It’s chilly in here,” he says, and no one responds. No one says anything and no one moves. We’re all just waiting for something we can work with, I guess.

When she gets tired of waiting, my mom goes over to my dad. She clasps his hand in hers. The she leans in to him, and he puts his head on her shoulder. She envelops him in a hug, and he hangs there in her arms, his own arms splayed out and not around her, and someone who didn’t know my dad might think he didn’t want the hug. But I know him a bit, and I know he does want it, that he desperately needs it. He just doesn’t know how to react because he’s sad and he’s broken, and that’s a tough combination.

Watching my mom hold my dad is like the time I went to the planetarium and watched this show about the stars and the planets. There’s this place where the planets shift, or maybe the sun covers the moon completely or vice versa, I don’t remember exactly what. I just remember feeling like the earth was shifting and my balance was gone and even though I was sitting and looking up at the ceiling, I felt like I could just fall over.

Turk comes and stands on my right, and Aisha stands on my left. I lean on both of them. They hold me up, and I’ve never felt this way before, supported like a building needs support beams. They keep me upright as the planets of my parents collide and stay collided.

Eventually we all sit down, my mom and dad on the love seat and the three of us on the big couch. No one says much of anything.

My dad finally says, “He was alone and sick, and I couldn’t help him.”

Turk shakes his head slowly. “He wasn’t alone.”

My dad nods vacantly.

“He loved you very much and he knew you loved him and that’s the truth,” Turk says.

“Why did this have to happen to me?” Dad asks. “Us, I mean.”

No one has an answer for that one.

“All this wasted time….” he says.

Turk tells a few funny stories about the things my granddad did in San Francisco, like the time he dressed up for Halloween in a blond wig, pantsuit, and poofy hat, and around his midsection was a bulky felt square, with six round white dots on the back side, one round white dot on the front.

“He was Princess Die,” Turk says, and my mother, of all people, laughs. My dad hangs his head, and I realize it’s not that easy taking this all in, hearing about what your dad was doing when he wasn’t with you, for whatever reason. Like if your dad can’t be with you, he should be miserable the whole time. I definitely know that feeling.

I guess Turk gets it too, because he says, “At least once a week, Matthew, I’d wake up to your dad’s sobs. He was an utter mess, not being able to be with you.”

My dad chews his bottom lip. My mom squeezes his hand, and after a while, I see him squeeze hers back.

It’s after midnight when we finish talking, and my mother tries to figure out where everyone can sleep. Turk will get the living room couch, she says, and she brings out fresh linen for him.

“Would you be happier on a nice, working air mattress?” I ask.

He moves his head from side to side, considering this. “You have an extra one?”

“Nope. We don’t have any. We have one that leaks air, and Aisha’s been sleeping on that one. I’ve been sleeping on the rug with a blanket. But on the positive side, I now have a wealthy grandfather who owes me presents.”

“Carson,” my mother says, but Turk laughs.

“He’s right, you know. I’m a single guy in my seventies with money and no one to spend it on. Until now, that is. Let’s go shopping in the morning.”

“That meeting,” my dad says softly.

“Of course,” Turk says. He looks at all of us and says, “Your father has asked me to take him to an AA meeting. Aisha, would you take a look online and find one tomorrow morning?”

She nods, and the room seems to soften. I close my eyes and it’s almost like I can feel my grandfather’s spirit expand and sigh and relax. And I know that whether or not that’s really happening, wherever my grandfather is or isn’t, he’s happy about this.

THE NEXT MORNING, I jump out of bed as soon as I’m awake, kiss the still-sleeping Aisha on the forehead, and speed upstairs. It feels like Christmas morning to me. Like there are presents under the tree.