“You know, you’re really smart for a twelve-year-old,” I say with a sniff, a tear falling.
Her eyes water, but she brushes past the emotions as she gives me a cocky grin.
“I’m glad you’re finally noticing.”
I roll my eyes and take a deep breath before pulling her into me for a tight hug. When I finally release her, I pull back and scan her face once more. There’s a bit of hurt beneath her tough exterior, but that’s normal. I also see genuine gratitude and love for me on her face.
“So you’re good?” I ask, and she nods.
“I’d be even better if you could convince Dad that we should bake some of that cookie dough we put in the freezer last week.”
I give her a stern look, but I’m also secretly grateful for the slight comic relief.
“You had a funnel cake with ice cream and split a bag of zeppoles with your uncle, Emma.”
“It was a very trying day,” she says, suddenly looking worn out and weary, and I can’t help but let out a laugh. “I bet I could convince him to let me.”
I smile. “You’re on.”
Then we both leave her room, and when Jesse gives me a questioning look, I give him a subtle thumbs-up. And even though the look of introspection doesn’t leave Jesse’s face all night, we do have cookies.
The next morning, I wake up with the sun barely creeping into our room, but I do it to an empty bed. Sitting up, I look around the dim room but see no trace of my boyfriend. Rolling out of bed, I blink tiredly as I slip a pair of sweats under the oversized T-shirt I slept in, then quietly pad to the kitchen. Relief floods me when I spot Jesse holding a mug of coffee and staring out the kitchen window.
“Morning,” I whisper, knocking him out of his daze. He turns to me, but when I catch sight of him, my stomach sinks to the ground at the blank look on his face.
“Morning,” he says, setting his mug down, then moving to the coffee pot on autopilot, grabbing a mug, and pouring me a cup. I watch as he moves to the fridge for my creamer and tops it off. “Want to drink on the patio?”
I lift a shoulder but nod, and he tops off his mug before we move through our room in silence with our coffees. It’s cool but not cold in the early morning, but the birds are up and singing as the sun creeps up over the trees, and I can’t say it’s not a perfect morning.
Except, of course, for the look on Jesse’s face.
We sit in silence for a bit before finally, I set my coffee down. “You gonna tell me why I woke up in an empty bed this morning?”
It was the first time I could remember waking up that way since we told Emma about us, and I didn’t like it, if I’m being honest. Now, mixed with the look on his face and his introspective silence, nerves are coursing through me.
“I couldn’t sleep, and I didn’t want you to wake up from my tossing and turning,” he says, and I try not to point out that he always wakes up before me, but he never leaves the bed before me.
“Something on your mind?” I ask. A deep sigh leaves his chest, and he looks out over the woods. Silence spans, and I think I’ll have to say something more to fill in the gap, but finally, he speaks.
“I did that, you know.” I don’t speak, unsure of what to say or what he means, but eventually, he continues. “To Kim. I did that. I fit her into my vision of a picture-perfect family when Emma was born and never took her into account.”
My heart breaks, realizing that this is what’s been weighing on him since yesterday.
“Jesse—” I start, but he keeps speaking.
“I did. I found out she was pregnant, and I made a plan. I barely involved her in those decisions. I decided we’d live near campus until we graduated, then move to my parents’ property. She said she wanted to be a singer, but she was getting a marketing degree. I told her we could figure out what she wanted to do once Emma was a bit older, and she agreed. After that, she took on raising Emma, and I took on making the money we needed to survive. We were young, and I was scared, and if I’m being honest with myself, I don’t regret it. I did what I had to do to make a stable life for Emma. At the end of the day, I think at some point, it would have ended the same regardless. But my part in it, the way I forced her into that life, that was my fault. Sometimes I think if I didn’t, she wouldn’t be so adamant to stayaway from here, from the town I chained her in. She might visit more and might have more of a relationship with Emma.”
“She was an adult, Jesse. Did she tell you that wasn’t what she wanted?” He shakes his head. “That was her responsibility. You can’t read minds, much less when you’re unexpectedly raising a child and trying to keep a roof over everyone’s heads. I’m not saying you were perfect, but she is just as much at fault. Your relationship with her does not explain or cancel out literal years of her ignoring Emma and neglecting being her mother.” He sits back in his chair but still doesn’t look at me.
“What if she’s right? What if I’m doing it all over again?”
For a moment, I pause, unsure of what he’s saying, but then it clicks: he means with me.
Her nasty words come back to me then, asking if he found another woman to con into raising Emma, and I realize that those are the ones that stuck deep for him.
“With me?”
“I decided I wanted you to be mine, to be ours, and I shoved you into my life. You make dinner, and you clean the house, and you watch Emma?—”
