My voice is a whisper in the darkness. “I miss you.”
Chapter 9
Over the next couple of days, I get a kind of routine going. Drop off Hope with Alan, spend all day at soccer, pick up Hope and drop her off with my mom, go to work, go home, get as much sleep between the crying fits as I can. I haven’t managed to repeat the mellow nighttime feeding of the other night, but I have remembered to call Alan at lunch to check up on Hope. Plus, I’ve successfully avoided being in the same room as my mother for longer than two minutes at a time, so she hasn’t been able to bring up the whole day care conversation again. I think she’s been cutting me some slack because of our intense as all hell discussion at the kitchen table on Monday, but I see that look in her eyes—the reprieve isn’t going to last forever.
“Where do you live?” Joni asks me Thursday at work.
“Why?”
“So I can pick you up for our tattoo extravaganza tomorrow.”
Nope. No way she’s coming to my house. “I thought you didn’t have a car.”
“I don’t. But I borrow my stepbrother’s car sometimes.”
Well, that won’t do at all. “Where’s the tattoo place?”
“Laconia.”
Perfect. “And you live in Clinton, right?”
“Yeah.”
“It doesn’t make sense for you to come all the way out to Downey to pick me up. It’s way out of the way for you. I’ll pick you up.”
She shrugs. “Have it your way, Brooks. I was trying to be a gentleman.”
I laugh. “You don’t look much like a gentleman to me, lady.”
We swap phones and enter our contact information. I feel a strange relief at knowing that I have a way to get in touch with Joni now. If I ever wanted to.
“Who’s this?” she asks, holding up the home screen.
It’s a photo of me and Meg at our spot at the lake, my arms around her as I give her a kiss on the cheek, her arm extended out in front of her as she takes the picture of us, her face all red and laughing. I look at that photo every time I use my phone. There’s no reason for me to act weird about it now. Except for the fact that I can’t tell Joni the truth.
“Oh,” I say, taking the phone back and pushing the button that makes the screen go dark. “That’s my ex.” I keep my voice as nonchalant as I can.
“An ex and yet you still have her picture as the background on your phone.” Joni looks at me all knowingly. “Methinks somebody’s not quite over it.”
I shake my head. “No, it’s very over. Trust me on that.”
“Then why the photo?”
A woman with long, gray hair stops her cart next to us and saves me from having to explain. “Excuse me,” she murmurs and steps between us to study the various brands of sprouted quinoa. She has a bag of kale chips in her cart. Funny how when I first met Meg, I had no idea what a kale chip was, and now I work in a store where they fly off the shelves. One more thing to remind me of her.
We step back to give the woman some space, and I shove the phone in my back pocket. While we wait for her to go away, I straighten a few sacks of whole wheat flour.
“Can I help you find anything?” Joni asks her.
“No, no, just looking,” she says. Finally she plucks a bag of quinoa off the shelf and leaves.
“So,” I say to Joni right away, “what time should I pick you up tomorrow?”
“My appointment’s at five thirty. Maybe, like, five? Does that work?”
That actually works out perfectly. Just enough time to leave Hope with my mom and get the hell out of there again.
• • •
“I’m going out, Mom.” I stop at her office door on my way to get Joni. “Hope’s in her swing.”
Mom’s office is covered in pink feathers. She’s even got a couple sticking out of her hair. “Hold on.” She looks up, glue gun in hand.
“What is this, a flamingo-themed wedding?” I ask, joking.
She smiles. “Actually, yeah.”
“Really?” I haven’t guessed one of these right in a while.
“Hey, as long as it pays the bills, I don’t ask questions,” Mom says.
“You do realize that exact sentence has been uttered by every person who was ever involved in anything illegal?”