“Have great parents." I told him."

“Your mom, especially, she dedicated herself to being a good woman to me and even more so when she had you, being a mother means the word to her, Paul. You made her feel like she's worth something."

“She shouldn't have had to have me for that."

“You're right, but she never thought much of herself, and even with me only to a certain extent, you gave her a real reason to feel special."

“Obviously you and mom got back together." I prodded him, "How?" "For the next week I ignored her calls. I felt terrible, but during that time I'd decided to go into an adult video store and make sure this wasn't some kind of sick joke." He rolled his eyes, “One of the first things I saw was a full size poster of your mother topless on the wall over a row of movies that all featured her."

“I stood there looking at the dozens of movies in shock and a couple of other guys were there and talking about how wild she was, how she'd do anything and seemed to love it. I should have just gotten out of there, but instead? I bought one of the movies."

“Why?" I asked him, but was partially asking myself the same thing, after all, I'd popped one in within minutes of finding it.

“Damned if I know." He looked genuinely upset as he spoke, "But I wished to hell I hadn't because as you can see, I'm still watching the fucking things."

I was going to press him on that, again because maybe it would make me not feel so bad that I'd not only watched, but had been strangely aroused.

“I'LL get to that. But for now, I took it home and watched it and as appalled as I was watching her I was into it as well, ended up, well, you're a kid, you know." He looked away embarrassed.

“But even with that, I couldn't have a relationship with a woman whose day at work was fucking other men."

"Two weeks later I go to work and your mother's outside on the steps. She's wearing this horrible pink waitress uniform with a name tag and like a d-bag I asked if that was for her new movie. I felt bad as soon as I said it and saw the pain on her face."

“You should have." I told him.

"Dick move, pop “I can't argue that, and because of that I said I was sorry and she asked if we could go across the street to the little coffee shop and talk for a few minutes. I went and she told me the waitress uniform was her new job. She'd quit the industry two days after I walked away from her and she said she would never go back, even if I didn't want her."

“I was happy she quit, but not sure I could deal with it. Think about it Paul, anytime we'd have sex I'd be thinking about what she did with those guys, not to mention they're, you know..."

“Hung like horses?" I finished.

“Crude, but true. We talked for over an hour, I ended up getting reamed for being late for work, but I promised we'd talk again that night and we did. She told me I'd made her feel loved and showed her respect she never thought she deserved and she wanted more of it. She begged me to take her back."

"I couldn't say no to her because as I'd said I'd already had feelings for her and I decided to try to put her past behind us. It wasn't easy, between me thinking of that movie which by the way she never knows I saw and the fear of her being recognized anywhere we went."

“Sad to say I felt ashamed for a little while, but as time went on and we grew closer I said the hell with it. The only problem was work as my boss knew exactly who she was so I left one of the top firms in LA to work for the small firm I'm still with. I lost out on a lot of prestige and money, but got an amazing woman out of the deal.”

“Don't forget your awesome son." I joked.

“That you are my boy." He said, “You're proving it now by how well you're taking this, a lot kids your age would be basket cases."

“Has anyone else ever recognized her?"

“Surprisingly, no." He said with obvious relief on his face.

“When we'd been together a few months and serious enough for her to move into my apartment with me we talked about moving."

“As an attorney I could get work anywhere and mom," he shrugged, "She dropped out of school and really had no skills other than," He tapped the box "So she's always waitressed. Even now, she doesn't need to work, but she likes to."