Chapter 147 THE WEAK EXPLANATION

Chapter 147 THE WEAK EXPLANATION
MAYA’S POV

The apartment felt too small. The warm smell of chocolate chip cookies that had been comforting only minutes earlier now sat heavy in the air. Luca stood a few feet away from me,  his eyes fixed on my face. Damon had already run back into the kitchen, calling something about the dough, but the single word Luca had spoken still hung between us.

“Mummy?”

I forced myself to meet his gaze. My hands were still wrapped around the kitchen towel. Flour dusted my shirt and the ends of my hair. My heart was beating so hard I was certain he could see it.

“Why is he calling you mummy?” Luca asked. His voice was calm, almost gentle, but there was something steady and unyielding underneath it.

I opened my mouth and the first thing that came out was a lie I had not planned.

“No… he just does that,” I said quickly. “He started calling my mum ‘Grandma,’ so he decided he would call me ‘Mummy.’ It’s just… something he does. Kids get ideas like that.”

Even as the words left my mouth I knew how stupid they sounded. The explanation did not make sense to me either. Damon had always called me Mommy because I was his mother. There was no game, no phase, no cute misunderstanding. 

Luca did not argue. He simply kept looking at me. His expression stayed controlled, but his eyes moved over my face as if he was measuring every shift in my expression. The silence stretched. I could hear Damon in the kitchen moving a chair, the soft scrape of wood against the floor.

“Okay,” Luca said at last. The single word carried no belief and no challenge. It simply sat there.

Before either of us could say more, Damon appeared again, this time holding a small plastic bin filled with his toy cars. He walked straight up to Luca and held the bin out with both hands.

“Do you want to see my cars?” he asked. “I have lots. Some are fast. Some are trucks.”

Luca’s attention shifted. He looked down at the boy, then crouched so they were closer to the same height. The careful distance he had kept with me softened when he spoke to Damon.

“I’d like that,” he said.

Damon grinned and carried the bin into the living room. He sat on the rug and began pulling cars out one by one, lining them up and explaining which ones were the fastest. Luca sat on the floor across from him, listening, asking small questions, turning a blue race car over in his hands when Damon offered it.

I stayed in the kitchen. My hands moved automatically. I finished scooping the rest of the dough onto the baking sheet. I slid the tray into the oven. I set the timer. Every movement felt disconnected from the rest of my body. My stomach kept churning, tight and restless. Nerves ran through me in waves. I wiped the counter even though it was already clean. I washed the mixing bowl twice.

From the living room I could hear Damon’s voice, bright and unbroken, and Luca’s lower replies. The ordinary sound of a man and a child talking about toy cars should have been comforting. Instead it made the fear sharper. Luca was here. He had seen Damon. He had heard the word “Mummy.” And my explanation had been paper-thin.

I leaned against the counter and pressed my palms flat against the cool surface. Four years of careful silence felt suddenly fragile. One Saturday morning, one unexpected knock, and everything I had protected was standing in my living room looking at toy cars with my son.

The oven timer beeped. I pulled the cookies out and set them on the cooling rack. The smell filled the apartment again. Damon ran in, Luca following at a slower pace.

“Are they ready?” Damon asked, bouncing on his toes.

“Almost,” I said. My voice sounded steadier than I felt. “They need to cool a little or you’ll burn your tongue.”

Luca stood near the doorway of the kitchen, watching me. I avoided his eyes and focused on transferring the cookies to a plate. My hands were not completely steady. A few crumbs fell onto the counter. I brushed them away too quickly.

Damon claimed the biggest cookie for himself even though he said it was for Grandma and carried it back to the living room, already talking about which car would win a race. Luca remained where he was for a moment longer.

“Maya,” he said quietly.

I looked up.

He did not repeat the question about the name. He did not accuse me of lying. He simply said, “We should talk later. When it’s just us.”

I nodded. The motion felt stiff. “Okay.”

He turned and followed Damon into the living room. I stayed in the kitchen, staring at the plate of cookies, listening to my son’s laughter and the low sound of Luca’s voice answering him. My stomach continued to churn. The nervousness did not ease. If anything, it settled deeper.

The afternoon stretched on. Damon showed Luca every car in the collection. They built a short track with books and cushions. I made more coffee and pretended the ordinary scene in front of me was not the most dangerous thing that had happened in months. Every time Luca’s eyes met mine across the room, the weak explanation I had given earlier felt thinner.

When Mom finally returned, keys in hand, the apartment shifted again. She took in the scene, Luca on the floor with Damon, me standing too rigidly near the counter and her expression tightened for only a second before she smoothed it away.

Luca stood, polite as always. Introductions were brief. Conversation stayed on the surface. After a while he said he should go. Damon waved goodbye with a cookie in one hand. I walked Luca to the door.

In the hallway he paused.

“He’s a good kid,” he said.

“Yes,” I answered. “He is.”

Luca studied me one last time. Whatever he was thinking stayed behind his eyes. He left without asking the question again.

I closed the door and leaned against it. My stomach was still churning. The weak explanation still sat in the air of the apartment like something that had not quite landed. Damon was already back to his cars. Mom was watching me with quiet understanding.

The secret was still intact. Barely.

But the space it needed to survive in was getting smaller by the hour.