CHAPTER ONE
Quinn
Tuesday, March 26
I DO THREEthings really well, but saying no isn’t one of them. I’m too susceptible to begging—especially from young children, small dogs, and good-looking men.
“Read me another story, Auntie Quinn.”
My goddaughter, Lily, is a case in point. It’s forty minutes past her bedtime, and I’ve already read her five books. A request from the adorable three-year-old—it’s hard to believe she’ll be four in just four months!—is nearly impossible for me to turn down.
I close the cover ofThe Velveteen Rabbit, ruffle Lily’s honey-colored hair, and make a weak attempt. “It’s late, sweetie.” We’re both reclining against pillows on her low four-poster bed. She and her favorite stuffed animal, Sugar Bear, are tucked under her white duvet, and I’m lying on top of it, my sandals kicked off, my arm looped around her. My black-and-white Maltipoo, Ruffles, is curled on the covers beside us.
“Just one more. Pleeeease?” Lily’s eyes are fringed with ridiculously long eyelashes, and when she turns them on me with that pleading look, my insides go as soft and gooey as a campfire marshmallow.
I’m staying overnight with Lily as I do every other month or so when Brooke has to leave New Orleans for a business trip. Brooke is an absolutely amazing single mother. She’s also a high-powered logistics executive at a major corporation and the most organized person I’ve ever met, and she runs as tight a ship at home as she does at work.
Whenever I babysit, I try to keep Lily on her schedule, but my willpower is no match for the child’s swimming pool–blue eyes.
“Just one more teensy-tiny book. Please, please, please?”
Resistance is futile. “Okay, one more, but only if you promise to go right to sleep afterward, with no fuss.”
“I promise.”
“All right, then.” I search my mind for the name of a book that’s short. “How aboutGoodnight Moon?”
“Yay!” Lily scrambles out of bed and scurries to her bookcase, her blond curls bouncing. Ruffles jumps down, scampers to her side, and positions herself to get petted.
I wonder if the way I consistently cave to Lily’s wishes means I won’t be a good mother. I hope not. More than anything, I want to have a child and be a loving, supportive mom like Brooke. It’s the deepest desire of my heart.
My mind darts to the future, and a little thrill starts to quiver through my chest. If things go the way I hope, then maybe soon I’ll...
Keep your thoughts in the here and now, I caution myself.Manage your expectations and you’ll manage your disappointments. This is a directive from one of the many self-improvement books I’ve read lately, because I’m working very hard right now on becoming the best person I can be. Managing disappointment is a concept I should have learned as a girl—heaven only knows I had ample opportunity—but I never quite got the knack of it, at least not when it comes to my personal life.
Especially when it comes to men. On two separate occasions, I’ve deluded myself into thinking I found Mr. Right, only to discover that the object of my affections was Mr. Wasting My Fertile Years. One relationship lasted six years and the other ate up four, adding up to a solid decade of squandered time—time when I should have been out there, meeting a man who really and truly wants the same things I do. A man who—and this is the important part, the part I keep missing—is really as wonderful as I think he is.
Brooke says I put too much stock in fairy tales. She thinks I have a bad habit of looking at men through rose-colored glasses, imagining positive traits that don’t exist and ignoring negatives that are all too real. I hate to admit it, but she’s right. Both times, I fooled myself into thinking that I’d found Prince Charming because that’s what I so desperately wanted.
Well, I’m on a new track now. I’m all about facing reality, dealing with the stone-cold truth, and pulling up my big-girl pants. I’m determined to live life on my own terms and according to my own timeline. Instead of imagining that a man is going to come along and complete me, I’m working on completing myself.
One of the books I’m reading,Reparenting Your Inner Child with Compassion and Mindfulness, instructs readers to find three things they’re really good at, and to appreciate and nurture those strengths every day. I love this exercise because the Rule of Three is one of my favorite design principles. The three strengths I’ve identified are being a good friend, finding the silver lining, and designing homes that people love to live in.
While Lily crouches in front of her bookcase, I look around the room and try to appreciate my design handiwork. I decorated the nursery when Brooke was expecting—I was actually living in Atlanta at the time—and I updated it after I moved to New Orleans, when Lily outgrew her convertible crib/toddler bed. I specialize in creating children’s rooms that easily change as their occupants grow.
I feel a sense of satisfaction, because Lily’s room is one of my all-time favorite little-girl spaces ever. It features pale grayish-green walls, pink silk draperies, and a matching faux canopy spilling from a crown-shaped cornice near the ceiling. The furniture is a whimsical mix of modern, antique, and art deco styles, tied together with touches of distressed white paint.
“Here it is!” Lily grabs the small board book from the shelf. Her bare feet pad whippet-fast across the thick white rug that covers the wide oak planks, her tiny toenails the same shade of aqua as her Elsa nightgown (I’d painted them for her earlier in the evening).She jumps on the mattress, dives under the covers, and curls up beside me as I open the well-worn book. Ruffles bounds up and settles on top of both of us. Lily giggles and snuggles close, her little body warm against mine.
When I finish reading aloud and close the book, Lily and I kneel by her bed, and she says her prayers. “Thank you, God, for all that’s good, an’ help me do the things I should. Bless Mommy an’ Grams an’ Auntie Quinn an’ Ruffles. An’ give me a little sister. Amen.”
I smile as she scrambles back under the covers while I put all six books back on the bookshelf. I tuck in Lily and Sugar Bear yet again, smoothing the pink-and-white-striped sheet over the top of the white duvet, and drop a kiss on her forehead. “Nighty night, sweet princess.”
“G’night, Auntie Quinn. I love you!”
Lily’s arms curl around my neck. She smells like bubblegum-flavored toothpaste and baby shampoo, and the scent makes my eyes unexpectedly fill with tears. “Love you, too, darling girl.”
I turn out her bedside lamp. Ruffles pads into the hallway. I pull Lily’s door closed behind me and head down the hall, my heart as warm and soft as a just-baked cinnamon roll.
