stop him. He’s a grown man. I just don’t have time.”
“To make the bed?”
I pause. “Wouldn’t I be un-making it?”
There’s hesitation. “You’re right, this analogy is stupid. Whatever. I just don’t want you to grow cobwebs where the sun doesn’t shine.”
Rolling my eyes, I tell Ainsley she can play for a few more minutes before she needs to get out. “Don’t worry, my sheets will be perfectly fine unruffled.”
She bursts out laughing. “You’re so weird.”
I scoff. “You’re the one who made the analogy! I’m just trying to go along with it.”
I unfold the towel and gesture for Ainsley to stand up. When she does, I make quick to dry her off before wrapping it around her and picking her up. Once her feet hit the bathmat in front of the tub, I finish drying her off before passing her, her pajamas to change into.
Reaching out my hand for her, I grab my phone and walk toward Ainsley’s room. “I need to help Ains finish getting ready for bed. Can I call you back when I’m done?”
Jenna sighs lightly. “As much as I’d love to complain about my day at work, I should probably be productive. I need to ride the exercise bike for like two hours to burn off the amount of Nutella I just ate.”
I grin. “Tell me tomorrow?”
“If I don’t murder my boss first.”
“I don’t have bail money,” I warn.
“Then give me an alibi.”
She hangs up before I can answer, causing me to laugh and slide my phone into my back pocket. I help Ainsley into bed, passing her the teddy bear I know she loves sleeping with and pulling her comforter over her. “Your Aunt Jenna is crazy, you know that?”
Ainsley smiles.
I pass her the lavender quilt next, watching her cuddle up into it. “I love you so much, Nugget. Want me to read to you?”
She points to a book next to her bed, the same one she always wants me to read. The black and white checkered hardback book is falling apart from the amount of times it’s been read. But she loves the nursery rhymes in it, so I crack it open and accept I’ll have to find some sort of glue to hold the spine and pages together before it completely disintegrates.
It doesn’t take long before she falls asleep, leaving me kissing her forehead and creeping out to clean up downstairs before shutting off the lights and heading to my room. It’s early but I’m tired and moody from the day’s events, leaving me curled up in bed with my phone and searching classes at the Rec Center.
Sometime later I hear footsteps outside my bedroom door that wakes me. The doorknob handle turns slowly, but the door never opens. I watch and wait, holding my breath, before the footsteps walk away and a different door across the hall opens and closes.
I swallow.
And tell myself it doesn’t matter.
Chapter Nine
Carrying a six-year-old into the house after she passed out from a cake coma shouldn’t feel any different than carrying a five-year-old, but it is. It’s not just the physical weight of her body in my arms that keeps a somber feeling in my chest but knowing that we spent another year together. I never thought about having kids until I got the call from Danny’s lawyer saying I was appointed legal guardianship.
Laying her on her mattress, I stare down at the crusted frosting on the corner of her lips and the glitter in her hair that I’ll find ten years from now and manage to smile. It’s a shaky gesture, but a sincere one as I recall the busy day of bright eyes and hand squeezes as Mable and a few others doted on Ainsley and showered her with gifts, sugar, and praise. She loved every second of attention.
Jenna appears in the doorway, her head cocked as she studies Ainsley. “She kinda looks like I did after our first party freshman year. You know, after you held my hair back when I threw up the tequila shots I took?”
I shiver, practically smelling the horrors of that night—alcohol and poor decisions. Not a good combination. “I’ve never been able to go near that stuff.”
She grins. “I have. Many times.”
Oh, I know it. I’ve held her hair back more times than I could count. “She looks way more peaceful. You were groaning and ranting on and on about how you’d never make that mistake again. Wasn’t it like a week later that you dragged me back out?”