Chapter Sixteen
Nolan
“Kids, dinner’s ready. Go wash your hands.”
Tonight I’m trying a new recipe that Lucas found, a lemon chicken dish that, I have to admit, has the house smelling pretty dang good.
Tuesday nights are one of my cooking nights. If Katie wasn’t still working on homework, with Lucas and Caine helping her, she’d be in here helping me. She’s my little sous-chef. Three weeks into second grade, and we can already see she’s going to be an amazing student.
Her teachers talked to us—because obviously I looped Zoey and Arlo into the discussion—about having her skip second grade and putting her in third. We decided we didn’t want to do that this year. She’s already a little smaller than some of her classmates, and we don’t want her feeling out of place.
Arlo and Zoey emerge from our bedroom, where they were “taking a shower.”
Which is what we tell Katie we’re doing. Except we didn’t tell her that me and Zoey already “had a shower” earlier, which was why Arlo had picked her up from school today instead of me or Zoey.
Tomorrow, me and Arlo will probably sneak away for a “shower.”
Life’s gotten a little hectic with the new school year, but we’re quickly finding our groove. Over the past couple of weeks we’ve filled our storage unit, and the house no longer looks like a thrift store exploded in it. We’re not ready to put this house on the market just yet, but we’re getting close. Our new house has a foundation and frame walls and roofing trusses. When we went to take a look at it this weekend, Katie excitedly squealed as she ran around inside her room, despite it being nothing more than stud walls and a concrete floor.
Her excitement is contagious, though.
While she was doing that, we walked the path from that end of the house, through the living room, dining room, and kitchen, down the hallway past the den and utility room, to where our bedrooms are.
With the secret out, we don’t have to fib about the extra bedroom, which will basically be our library area away from the kids.
Okay, so maybe it’ll also hold the big TV that me and Arlo want so we can play video games without Zoey griping that we’re keeping her awake.
I stand in the middle of what will be our master bathroom and look around. “Damn. This ishuge.”
“Right?” Arlo said as he pulled me to him for a kiss.
I snap myself back to the present, where a smiling Zoey leans in for a kiss from me. “Thank you for cooking dinner, Daddy.”
“You’re welcome, Mommy.”
“Whippersnapper,” Arlo teases before he kisses me.
“Old geezer,” I playfully shoot back as I hand him a bowl of mashed potatoes to carry out to the dining room table. And we all laugh.
Damnit feels good to laugh all the time.
Caine’s here tonight because his parents went out of town for a week for a work conference for his dad, and his parents asked if we’d minded if he stayed with us. He could’ve stayed alone at home—and in fact will be stopping by there every day to check the mail and water plants—but he’s a fixture around here as much as Lucas is a fixture at their house.
At least they don’t have to hide their relationship from us.
The more I see them together, the more I’m convinced—we all are—that there’s probably a wedding in their future. They really are a modern me and Arlo, without the desperation and sneaking around.
Or fear.
We’re just sitting down to eat when the doorbell rings.
Damnit. That figures. “I’ve got it.” I’m about to put aNo Solicitingsign on the front door. Usually, it’s religious people trying to convert us, but with the start of the school year we’ve already had two kids peddling magazines and one selling candy bars.
That’s why I don’t even look before I open the door.
Which is why I have difficulty processing that it’s Bill Motherfucking Webb standing on my front porch.
And it’s also why it takes me a moment to finally make my voice work. “What thefuckdoyouwant?”
