“Can we go swimming, Daddy?”
I look up from the jigsaw my son, Donkey, and I are currently working on to peer outside, the heavy rain thundering down, hitting the roof tiles. “Swimming? It’s raining, little lion.”
“Yeah, swimming in the puddles.” Leo’s innocent eyes lock with mine, and I can’t help but laugh.
“The puddles aren’t deep enough to swim in. Besides, they’ll be all dirty, kiddo.” I stand, observing the summer storm that has decided to pay Montana a visit. The sky rolls with thunder, the trees swaying from side to side as the wind cuts through them. Puddles accumulate across the grass.
“Flo said I could swim in a puddle.”
I narrow my eyes at the cabin, making a mental note to talk to her and tell her not to promise my son things that aren’t possible. “Well, if Flo can prove to me that swimming in a puddle is possible, then I’ll let you.”
I know exactly what she’ll come out with if I ask her to do just that, though. She’ll tell me, “Lakes are just big puddles.” And she’ll have that smug look on her face when she says it, too, looking up at me with those big blue eyes that entice me far more than they should. Cranberry lips that’ll be pouted and plump. Nose upturned, like my scowl doesn’t affect her in the slightest.
I felt the way she melted against me in the closet the other day. The way her body froze and her breath hitched. How her muscles relaxed against my own. How right it felt.
I can’t lie and say I haven’t spent the hours in which I’m awake at night, wondering if she’s in the cabin pleasuring herself, and it’s taken all the self-control I can muster not to march my way down there to ask if she’ll show me what she uses, and how she uses it.
“Flo said I was handsome,” Leo says as he plays with the puzzle pieces, trying to force one into a position it doesn’t belong in, so I take it from him and help, showing him exactly where it’s supposed to go.
“You are.” I ruffle up his hair and wrap my arms around his torso, pulling him to me as I flop down on the couch. “The most handsome boy in the whole of Missarali. Nope, scratch that, the entire state of Montana, actually.”
Blowing on his belly, Leo squeals, pushing at me to try to get away, but I have a vice-like grip around him.
“No, the world!” Leo finally escapes me, and he breathes heavily as he tries to control his laughter. “Flo said you were handsome.”
That gets my attention. I cock my head at my son, leaning forward, straightening his shirt. “Oh, yeah? When did she say that?”
“She was doing my hair.” He picks up Donkey, fingers playing with his mane—or what’s left of it. “Said I was handsome like my Daddy.”
My stomach drops—in a good way—and warmth flourishes inside my chest. Flo is the perfect mix of soft, responsible and authoritative when it comes to taking care of my son, and I feel ashamed that I ever doubted her.
“What did she say after that?”
“Nothing. We played water guns. I won.”
“I think you’ll find I actually won, bud.” I remember that day. I’d returned home to find both of them soaking wet on the grass, watching the butterflies land on a nearby plant, and I snuck Flo’s water gun when they weren’t looking and blasted them until the gun was dry.
Hearing that Flo thinks I’m handsome, I like it. It wouldn’t mean anything from anyone else, and usually, I’d be praying for a nanny who finds me grotesque. But Flo’s different.
There’s a sudden knock at the door, and glancing at the time, seeing it’s late and the sun’s almost already set, confusion wracks me at who could be here at this hour. Pulling it open, not all the way so the wind doesn’t blowthe rain in, I’m met with a sopping wet Flo, her hair stuck to her neck in curled ribbons. She looks slightly teary-eyed, but I can’t tell if the porch lights are playing tricks on me.
“Flo?” I immediately open the door as wide as it can go. “What the hell are you doing out in the rain? It’s freezing.”
Her green T-shirt is soaked through. She shifts her weight from one foot to the other, arms wrapping around herself as she glances back at the cabin. “I just got back from seeing my Mom, and um, I think… the roof is leaking in my cabin. It’s all… yeah.”
Protectiveness fills me seeing her so cold and vulnerable, so I swap places with her, encouraging her to grab a blanket and get warm. My palms find her biceps, rubbing up and down to create some friction and heat her icy skin. “I’ll go and have a look. Stay here.”
Jogging over to the cabin, I’m met with a slow, steady dripping sound. Flo has placed a bucket on the wet floorboards, trying to catch the leak, but it’s coming from multiple sources, and I curse the handyman I hired at the last minute to get this place fixed up.
“Fuck,” I grumble once I see what the leak has done. The clothes Flo has been working on for her niece are soaked through, her pastel-blue sewing machine shiny with water droplets, with spare needles and materials scattered all over the small table. All in a pool.
Grabbing Flo’s duct tape and standing on a chair to patch up the small holes in the roof to stop the leaking—I’ll check back later to see if the tapehas held up—I gather up Flo’s work so they don’t marinate in the dirty water. After grabbing a few of her essentials, too, like her toiletries and insulin, I exit the cabin. The rain and wind assault me as I jog back to the main house.
Flo is standing in the middle of the living room, a towel from the bathroom wrapped around her, with Leo by her feet, trying to help dry her legs.
She looks sad, and I hate it.
“I taped the holes in the roof up, but it won’t hold for very long. We just have to hope the rain doesn’t get worse. I got the clothes you were working on. They’re wet, but I’ll hang them up in the bathroom for you.”
