"Thanks, Mom," he said, and she winced. "I'm kidding," he said hastily. "Dumb joke."

"Probably not." Nina put the pot back on the wanner and sank into her seat. "I'm practically old enough to be your mother."

"Not unless you had a lot more fun in kindergarten than I did," he said, and Nina said, "I'm forty. Two days ago, as a matter of fact."

Alex nodded wisely. "It's those years that end in zero that kill you. Twenty-nine was nothing like this."

"Thirty-nine sucked, too," Nina said. "I got divorced."

Alex winced. "Sorry."

Nina shook her head. "No, it's fine now. I have my own place, and I can do anything I want, and I love it. Last night after you left, Fred and I stayed up and watched The Great Escape until one-thirty. You can't do that when you're married. I missed out on a lot of great movies because Guy didn't like it when I stayed up late. I love being single."

Alex blinked. "I watched it, too. Steve McQueen and the catcher's mitt. You like old movies?"

Nina nodded. "And James Garner. James Garner is great in that movie." Then she frowned at him. "Now back to your problem. From the wisdom of my advanced years, I can tell you that waiting too long to start a career is a mistake."

Alex sipped his coffee. "You just starting one now?"

"Going back to one I abandoned sixteen years ago," Nina said. "I got very lucky and found a job in publishing after my divorce, but if I'd stayed at it, people would be working for me instead of me working for them. It took me six months to advance from secretary to assistant editor. One of the editors who has seniority over me is your age. It's hard."

Alex shrugged and sipped again. "Why do you care? Age is irrelevant."

"Tell me that when you're forty." Nina put her mug down. "Come on, let's work on your future. You said you liked science courses in school."

"I said I took science courses in school. I didn't say I liked them." He took another sip. "This is excellent coffee. What kind is it?"

"Don't try to change the subject. What do you like?"

"People. Excitement. Noise. Color."

"Maybe we can get you in with the circus," Nina said acidly. "Concentrate here. I'm trying to fix your life."

"You and my whole family. Why don't we leave my life alone? I like my life.'' Alex drained his coffee mug and then stared into it. "You know, this isn't supposed to work, but I do feel better. Must be the caffeine."

"How are you supporting yourself now?" Nina asked, hoping for a direction to steer him in.

"I'm a doctor." Alex pushed his empty mug toward her. "Could I have another cup, please?"

Nina blinked at him. "You're a what?"

"A doctor. Never mind, I'll get it." Alex got up and stepped over Fred to fill his mug from the pot before he gestured it in her direction. "You want more?"

"No." She didn't want more coffee, she wanted to kill him. He'd known what she'd been thinking and had just played along to amuse himself. Turgid as a Russian novelist. How juvenile of him. Well, he was young, but not that damn young. "Very funny. I want to know why the hell your family isn't happy with a thirty-year-old doctor."

"Because I work in the ER." Alex sat down again. "I like the ER. I have a very short attention span and there's always something going on there to keep me interested. Plus, I get to save lives, which makes me feel good."

Nina nodded and thought about strangling him. "And your family wants you to be what? A lawyer?"

"God, no." Alex looked horrified. "That's my uncle Robert. We do not mention his name." He grew thoughtful for a moment. "Although we do turn to him in times of malpractice suits."

He was being deliberately obtuse, which was his right since she was prying into things that were none of her business. She should just butt out. "I don't get this," she told him. "Explain it or you get no more coffee."

"My mother wants me to be a neurosurgeon," Alex said.

"Why?"

"Because she's a neurosurgeon and I am her only child." Alex sipped his coffee. "This stuff is great. I'm feeling human again."

Nina scowled at him. "I thought you said you had a brother and sister.''

"I do. She's an oncologist and he's a gynecologist." Alex stopped. "Oh, you mean, how am I an only child? They're half-sibs. Dad got married three times. We're all only children. It's a real bond."

Nina put her chin in her hand, fascinated. "And your father wants you to be what?"

"A cardiologist, since Stella and Max let him down." Alex drained his coffee mug. "I'm feeling a lot better. Have you got anything to eat?"

Nina stood and got a package of Oreos from the cupboard. Fred perked up and moved nearer to Alex's hand. "Why did they let him down?"

"Stella's mom died of cancer, so Stell fixated on that. Max, on the other hand, chose for aesthetic reasons."

"Gynecology is aesthetic?"

Alex broke open the package and took a cookie. Fred moaned a little and leaned on his leg, so Alex gave the cookie to him and took another for himself. Fred spit the cookie out, looked at it, licked it, nudged it with his nose, licked it again and then picked it up with his teeth and trotted off to the living room.

Alex watched him and then turned back to Nina. "Gourmet dog. Where was I? Oh, yeah, aesthetic gynecology. Well, as Max pointed out to me just an hour ago, why spend your life looking into the chest cavities of eighty-year-olds when you can look into-"

Nina shut her eyes and leaned back against the cupboard. "I don't want to hear this."

"-the eyes of women who are listening to your every word?"

Nina laughed and then tried to glare at him. "You set me up."

Alex grinned at her and nodded. "Just like Max set me up. I laughed, too. You'd like Max. He's old, almost thirty-six."

"Up yours," Nina said politely.

"And Stell is a little older than you. Forty-two, I think. You'd like Stell, too." Alex's eyes met hers, and she felt her heart thump funny for a moment. Stop that, she told her heart.

"Next time they do this," he told her, "you come along to protect me.''

I'm not going anywhere with you, sonny, she told him silently, but she wanted to know more, so she said, "And then there's your stepmother. Max's mother, right? What does she want you to be? A dermatologist?"

"No, that would be my cousin Tom." Alex crunched the last of another Oreo. "They'd disinherit me if I did that. I'm supposed to do something invasive not topical. Max's mom is a thoracic surgeon, but she doesn't care what I do as long as I pick a specialty."

"What's wrong with the ER?"

"No status, no fame, no glory." Alex picked up his third Oreo. "Do you have any milk?"

"Skim," Nina said and went to the refrigerator, shoving back the Crock-Pot on the top of the fridge that had inched its way forward as she opened the door.

"Why do you do that?" Alex asked.

Nina slammed the refrigerator door and turned. "Push the Crock-Pot? The top of the fridge is the only place I have to keep it, but the vibration from the motor makes it move forward." She squinted back at it. "I should find a better place, but the cupboards are full."

"It's going to fall on you," Alex said. "Move it."

Nina scowled at him. Just what she needed: an infant doctor giving her orders. "It's fine. Do you want this milk or not?"

Fred had returned by now and sat down with a thump by Alex, his butt hitting the ground like a sack of lumpy lead. He wiped his nose on Alex's pants.

Alex didn't seem to mind.

"Don't beg, Fred," Nina said. "Alex will think you've had no upbringing."

Alex fed him another cookie, and Fred went through the drop, lick, nudge routine again before he picked it up and trotted back to the couch. Alex turned to Nina. "Skim milk. How healthy of you." He got up and rinsed out his coffee mug before he held it out to her. "Thank you very much, I'll take some."

Nina poured his milk. "So what are you going to do?"

Alex collapsed into his chair. "I'm going to stay in the ER and just wait them out. They're busy people. Eventually they'll go back to their own lives. Except for Max, but he doesn't give a damn what I do. He's just trying to make sure I don't go for something so high-pressured that I become Dad."

Nina put the milk down on the table. "And that would be bad."

"That would be terrible. My father is a great doctor but a mediocre human being. The only way I'll ever have a real discussion with him is if I develop a heart murmur.'' Alex crunched into another cookie. "Do you know who raised me? Max's mom, Melanie. My mom left for a residency in Denver, and Dad was too busy, so Melanie just absorbed me into the family with Max and Stella. And Stella wasn't hers, either."

Nina conjured up a motherly thoracic surgeon, surrounded by three adoring children. It was a weird picture. "She must be a wonderful woman."

"Not really. Just efficient and responsible." That sounded awful. Poor Alex.

Alex straightened a little, and Nina realized her distress nust have shown in her face. "Hey, don't knock it," he told her. "When you're a kid, that's pretty good, especially if your own parents aren't around much." He shook his head, remembering. "One day we were all together, must have been a holiday, and I disagreed with something Melanie said, and Dad said, 'Do what your mother tells you' and Melanie just looked at him and said, 'I'm not his mother.' And Dad said, 'What?' And Melanie said, 'He's Mice's son.' My dad didn't even remember." Alex slouched back in his chair. "Thank God for Melanie. I'd never have made it to adulthood alive and sane." He stopped in the middle of his Oreo, a cautious look on his face, and put his hand on his stomach.

"Well, the sane's still up for grabs," Nina said. "All those Oreos on top of milk, scotch, whiskey, brandy, and beer can't be a good idea. And you call yourself a doctor."

Alex thought about it for a moment and finished the cookie. "I think it was the milk that was the bad idea. But you need milk with Oreos." He tried to look stern. "It's probably because it's skim milk. Whole milk would have coated my stomach."

Nina tried to look stern back at him. "How old did you say you were? Ten?"

"Very funny." He reached for another Oreo and she moved the package away. "Hey!"

"You've had enough. You're going to get sick."

He frowned at her. "You must be one mean mother."

"Nope," Nina said. "No kids."

Alex sat back. "Did I just put my foot in it?"

"Nope," Nina said again. "Never wanted any. I'm just not the maternal type."

"Now that's interesting." Alex leaned forward again and snagged another cookie while she was off guard. "I never want any, either. Neither does Stella. Max says he gets enough babies delivering them. I've always figured it was our lousy childhoods since we all lost parents. What's your excuse?"

"I'm the oldest of six kids," Nina said. "I already raised five brothers and sisters. I'm done."

Alex raised his eyebrows. "No mom?"

"I have a mother," Nina said, not wanting to discuss it. "She's not interested in children. She gave birth, and then we took it from there.''

Alex nodded sympathetically. "Career woman."

"No." Nina took an Oreo from the package, rattling the plastic and alerting Fred, who came to sit beside her. She blinked down at him, surprised by his enthusiasm, and fed him a cookie, and then watched him trot to the couch before she looked back over at Alex. "Not a career woman. Society woman. We had money, we just didn't have parents."

"So you went to college and became an editor?" Alex shook his head. "That doesn't make sense. You're either supposed to become your mother or her opposite."

"I thought that was marry your father or his opposite."

"Same difference. So you became your mother's opposite?"

"No." Nina put down her cookie as the realization dawned. "No, I became my mother. I married a lawyer and did the society thing and became a law-firm wife. My God, I did become my mother." She blinked at Alex. "No wonder the divorce felt so good. That life was hers. Now I'm living mine." She leaned back in her chair. "Boy, does this explain a lot of things." She picked up her Oreo and bit into it, feeling even more liberated than she had before.

"What kind of things?" Alex asked.

Nina stopped in midcookie. "Why do you want to know?"

"Well, I just spilled my family secrets to you," Alex said reasonably. "It's payback time."