He strode ahead without a second thought, never once considering that I was old, that my legs weren't what they used to be, that I couldn't keep up with him.
We had just reached the underground garage when his phone rang. Yvonne's voice came through the speaker.
"Cary, listen carefully. When you bring the car back, it needs to be disinfected. I already mixed the solution. It's in the trunk."
He pulled open the car door, and a sharp, acrid smell hit me like a wall.
I frowned and covered my nose.
The passenger seat, where I had been sitting, was drenched in disinfectant. And that wasn't all. Someone had wrapped the entire seat in plastic bags.
Cary glanced at it and scrambled to explain. "Mom, you know how Yvonne is. She's a germaphobe."
That excuse again.
A germaphobe. Right. She didn't have a germ problem. She had a me problem.
I climbed into the car and pulled the food containers out of the insulated bag. The bowls I'd used to cook Bryan's meal.
I turned them over in my hands for two seconds, then decided it was time to lay my cards on the table.
"Mom, what are you talking about? A dog bowl? That's impossible."
He was lying.