What's Life Without the Sprinkles - By Misty Simon Page 0,50

of confusion. She wished it was a chocolate cake. Maybe that would come later. She hadn’t been able to make herself bake a cake for this supposed celebration, but she would when it was all said and done.

“How are you doing?” May asked.

Claudia had stuffed some potato salad in her mouth and chewed for a while before swallowing. It gave her a chance to be as diplomatic as possible. “Fine. Everything was great. When does your dad want to start things?”

“Hopefully soon. Things are going well...so far. I don’t want it to explode from prolonged exposure.” May stared down at her clasped hands.

Claudia laughed and covered those hands with her own. “I can’t say I would have asked for this, but it actually did turn out okay. Peter and I had our first adult conversation in years, and it went fine. He even met Justin and was impressed with him. He complimented me on raising a good kid.” And hadn’t that been strange?

May grabbed Claudia’s hands and beamed at her. “Oh, that’s wonderful. I’m so happy things worked out so well.”

“I don’t know if I’d say they worked out well, but they worked out.” May’s smile slipped, and Claudia wanted to take the qualifier back. What did it matter if May wanted everyone to act like a big happy family? Would it kill Claudia to let her have her delusions for one afternoon?

May held up a hand before Claudia could get word one out. “No, you’re right. I was hoping for too much too soon. Sorry about that.”

“It’s okay, May. I know this is hard for you, harder since he seems to want to be a part of your family again. I just don’t think I can let him be part of our family.” She’d never been less than honest with May—except for that terrible period where May had worn green eye shadow with green eyeliner. But that was minor compared to this conversation. She had to be honest here. This wasn’t merely a fashion faux pas. “If he wants to be involved with Justin, we’d have to talk about that a lot before it happened. But he didn’t seem to want anything more than what Justin gave him, which was a little conversation and some insight into what a great kid he is.”

“That’s good. I’m glad, then. Do you know where he went? I wanted to make a little announcement.”

May lowered her eyelashes, and Claudia knew something was up. She hoped it didn’t have anything to do with her and Peter. “He went off with Brad, somewhere in the back of the house. They could be grunting over tools, for all I know.” She did not want to offer to go find them. She’d done her good deed for the day by staying in this house with Peter and eating lunch despite his presence. She didn’t need to go any further.

May wandered off with a slight smile on her face. Something was definitely up.

Ten minutes later Claudia waited in the family room with everyone else to find out what that secret smile had been about.

“We have an announcement to make,” Brad said, banging a plastic spoon against his plastic cup.

“That’s not very effective,” Peter said from the other side of the room.

Claudia’s gaze was drawn to him against her will. He was still a very good-looking man. He also had a magnetism that couldn’t be ignored, even if he had always been used to getting his way.

The conversation continued around them with all the adults jabbering away. Claudia put two fingers in her mouth and whistled. That stopped everyone in their conversational tracks. She smiled and waved a hand at May, grateful that, despite the magnetism, she felt nothing at all for Peter.

“Thanks, Claudia. I forgot you could do that.”

“No prob, May. I don’t get to use it often anymore.”

The small crowd laughed as Justin mumbled, “Yeah, right,” loud enough for everyone to hear.

Brad took the floor again and raised his plastic cup. “I’d like to thank all of you for coming. Today is a special day for more reasons than you know. Tell them, May.”

Eyes shining bright and hands clasped over her abdomen, May said, “We’re having a baby.”

Brad grabbed her up as if she weighed nothing and twirled her around while she laughed like a loon. Everyone crowded in to tell the soon-to-be parents how exciting this was. Claudia hung back for a moment so Brad’s parents could get to her first. And then May’s father rose