We stand in the gymnasium’s oversized open area, where art supplies and lumber are piled in their respective areas. My sideis filled with large canvas tarps that are waiting to be muralled into an inch of their fraying edges and the other side... well, that is supposed to become the large frame to hang said mural backdrops from.
And we need a plan.
I will not be responsible for messing this up and wasting the school’s limited resources. If there is one thing I take seriously in my life, it’s art.
Someone has to.
It’s only the sole expression of our existence on this planet as a species, after all.
No biggie.
Not to mention this is for the children’s holiday play. Safe to say, the stakes are high.
“Where do you want these, love?” Dad wanders over with a container that he’s... mixed all the paints together in.
Shit.
“Um—”
“Hank, good to see you again. You free to help with this frame up?” Quinton asks, shooting me an empathetic look as his gaze sweeps over the mixed paint.
“Oh, Quin! Thought you’d never ask.” Dad shoves the brown soupy mess into my arms and nods with a smile like he’s just passed me over for men’s business as he follows Quinton toward the pile of lumber. Maybe he will have better luck with something hands-on and not artistic?
And did he just call himQuin?
Now I feel like the third wheel . . .
“Daddy, where do you want these?” Maisey walks in, a tool belt in one hand, a tray of three coffees in the other.
Okay, make that the fourth wheel.
“Hi Celeste!” Maisey hands the tray to her dad, who has returned to where I stand as I gawk at his daughter. Her fiveyears are seemingly more capable than my thirty. It’s not every day you get showed up by a preschooler.
“Thanks, kiddo. Coffee, Celeste?” Quinton plucks a cup from the tray and hands it to me.
I stare at it like it’s a cobra, not a cappuccino.
“Not a fan of caffeine?” he asks, his eyes narrowing with amusement.
I take the cup from his hand, my fingers brushing over his. “I like caffeine just fine, MacKelvie. Just not the kind that comes with strings.”
“Strings?” His brows lower as he glances at his daughter.
I wait for Maisey to walk over to my father before saying, “You don’t need to butter me up. I can be professional about this circumstance.”
“I was?—”
“Daddy, Hank says he doesn’t drink whiskey in daylight hours?” Maisey is staring at my father who is walking the length of the timber pile, his hands on his hips.
“He doesn’t, hey? Well, maybe Miss Francis would like one. I saw her in the hall when we got here,” Quinton says.
Maisey screws her face up but wanders from the gymnasium to find who I assume is her teacher.
“Actually,” I say, breaking his concentration from staring at the retreating back of his daughter. “Hank can’t have coffee. Not anymore.”
“Oh, damn, sorry. Noted.” He runs a hand through his hair, and... that awkward silence hangs between us again.
“Right. I’m going to make a start. You good?” I wave a hand toward the timber and my father.
