Fox’s eyes widened. “What?”
He exhaled heavily. “I wanted to. I wanted her.” He closed his eyes for a few seconds before saying in a low voice, “Laney had died just a few weeks before. I had Melody, who just cried. I wanted to do right by Melody. Wanted to do everything right and couldn’t do anything right. Because her mother had just died! But I had this new responsibility — and I was suffocating under it. I had a child, my parents were trying to convince me that they should have custody, and I had lost my sister. It was too much, Fox, okay? So then Anna came to that damn bar and looked at me. And smiled.” He rubbed his face. “Shit, after her first two words, I forgot why I felt so bad. I talked to her and…made a joke. I’m not even the joking type, you know that! And when she kissed me, I forgot everything." He swallowed. “With her, I was able to breathe for the first time in months. Ineededher in order to breathe. I needed those few easy hours with her during the week, when I could be someone else.” His hands clenched.“So, yeah. It was stupid. But…I don’t regret it. I guess it’s only because of her that I didn’t go crazy.”
Fox stared at him and slowly dropped his hands. He looked stunned, almost perplexed.
Yeah, yeah, he didn’t usually talk so much, Lucas knew that!
“Moreau?” his best friend finally asked slowly, almost gently.
Lucas raised his eyebrows in annoyance. “What?”
“It sounds to me that, at first sight, you fell…” He trailed off — and Lucas’ stomach abruptly dropped.
“I what?” he asked tensely. Because whatever Fox was about to say, he was wrong!
Fox opened his mouth…
“I need a towel, Lu!” Melody shouted in frustration.
He jumped and hurried into the hallway. Maybe he didn’t want to hear what Fox had to say. No, in fact, he almost certainly didn’t.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, finding Melody standing on her stool, bent over the sink.
“There’s no towel,” she complained, pointing to the hook where one usually hung.
He nodded, reached into the cupboard to his right for a new one, and hung it up. “Thank you.” She started to step down from her stool, but he held her gently but firmly by the shoulders.
“Show me your hands, please.”
She placed her little fingers on his. They were still sticky, like the last two times. “They’re not clean yet, Mel,” he murmured gently. “Did you use soap?”
“Yes,” she said seriously.
“Melody…”
She sighed. “It takes so long with soap. I’m hungry.”
“Wash them again with soap, please. Your grandparents are coming in half an hour, so we have to hurry a bit. And eat a tomato, okay? I’ll put it on your plate.”
“All right,” she drawled, but didn’t turn on the water.
“Are you okay, Mel?”
She chewed on her lower lip. “Lu?”
“Hm?”
“Five days is a veeery long time.”
“I know.”
“And you fly, right? Planes crash.”
“Flying is very safe, Mel,” he whispered, crouching in front of her to be at eye level. “And I’m sorry, but the playoffs are only for a few more weeks, and after that, I’ll be here all summer.”
She swallowed and nodded. “I prefer it when you put me to bed. Grandma doesn’t like reading aloud much.”
“I’d be happy to read to you on the phone on the nights I don’t have a game.”
