“I… don’t know, Mom,” I said, totally mystified.

“Well, you can’t! So you just don’t!”

“So, it closed?”

“Well, obviously. So what’s this I hear about you shacking up with some rich professional?”

“What? Who told you?”

“Will you move the umbrella just a bit? Nelson told me.”

“Where does he get his information?” I asked, adjusting the umbrella.

“He called you at your apartment and the one with the strange giggle-”

“Kyle.”

“-told him you had shacked up. Naturally, he told me.”

“Good, it’s just one big game of telephone with my life,” I muttered, leaning back in my chair.

“It’s true, then?”

“I wasn’t shacking up, Mom. And she’s not really rich.”

Trying to explain life to her sometimes is a lot like explaining to a vending machine why it should take your *****, crumpled dollar. Neither of them listen, you know, and worse, anything you give them they just spit right back at you.

But living with her was all right for the most part, as long as we kept out of each other’s way and I didn’t try to talk to her before she’d had her coffee. The most notable thing to occur in these six or seven weeks was that I got a staff job at L.A. Weekly and was at the point where I could probably get my own apartment if I wanted, but still felt more comfortable with the idea of the roommate.

And, of course, Bette Porter showed up one day.

I think I was trying to make breakfast for my mom and her two dogs (that’s not a joke) or something, and when I looked out the window, there was a familiar-looking black BMW outside the gates. And a familiar-looking figure coming up the walkway. With an unfamiliar-looking haircut.

I hurried to the door. Not because I was happy to see her or anything; I mean, I wanted to get the door open before she knocked because the dogs tend to go crazy anytime someone knocks.

“Hey,” she said. I don’t know why she always looks so together, especially when I always feel like a nervous wreck. I bet my hair was sticking up.