If we’re speaking purely of physical characteristics, he favors Dalton. I wonder sometimes how that will shape him as a man, to bear resemblance to a convicted murderer, a woman beater, someone who left his mother for dead and him screaming in a crib. Is there a part of him that already senses his messed-up beginnings? Kids are intuitive, and I’ve had a hell of a time actingnormal. I’m not even sure what that entails anymore.
Ryker turns out of my view and lifts his sleeve, giving Remy a bigger glimpse of the ink on his chiseled bicep. “My brother drew on me. Can you believe that?”
Remy’s hazel eyes grow as big as saucers. “You let him?”
Ryker’s mouth twitches as he tosses a chocolate chip pancake in the air. “I did. He’s an artist, and it relaxes him to practice new designs on me.”
“Can he draw on me?” Remy asks.
I should have seen that coming.
Ryker chuckles. “I don’t think Mama would like that.” He fixes a plate with one mini pancake, whole, and cuts another into pieces. “You’re beautiful, like her, just the way you are. Already a piece of art. But if you draw me a picture, I’ll have him put it on me. And I’ll never erase it.”
Oh, my heart.
“Really?” Remy stares at him in utter stupefaction, and I realize that we rarely have interactions with men. Certainly nothing compared to this. “We only friends today.”
Cautious and untrusting, like me. I’ve unwittingly raised him to be skeptical of everyone. Depending on perspective, that either wins me a gold star or a finger-pointing from his future therapist.
“Actually, we were friends a long time ago, when you were a baby,” Ryker corrects, setting the plate down in front of him and tapping his button nose. “And we’ll be friends forever now.”
That knocks the wind out of me, so I tuck myself back into a ball on the floor just as Remy yells, “Smiley-face pancake!”
“Thought you’d like those. And Mama should be out any minute now. Isn’t that right, Merce?”
Busted. At the worst imaginable time. I’m a puddle, but like I do most days with Remy, I choke back the lump in my throat and rise as though I’m not a hot mess.
“It’s Alice, remember?” I shoot Ryker one of those get-it-together, I-have-a-new-identity scowls that only people in erasing situations get to sling before flashing a big grin at my chocolate-covered three-year-old. “Hey, sweet pea. You couldn’t wait to meet Ryker, huh?”
Ryker’s thunderous tenor piggybacks our greeting with a lilt that is woven with amusement. “You know, Alice, I’m a sucker fornicknames, so I think I’ll call you Mercy.”
That has my little guy giggling before he shows me his plate and yammers about his smiling pancakes and hisRyker-friend’s body picturesand the new toys he got—a kid-proof model of La Lune Noire and a jet.
Then he peers over at Ryker and very seriously informs him, “Mama gets in heremotonsa lot.”
Kids never miss a damn thing. And he talks so well that the mispronounced word made that news bulletin louder. I wipe atmy misty eyes, all the fun and games of their morning crashing around us. My pain muddies everything.
“Mama’s okay, Rem.” I smooth his unruly hair off his forehead, soothing him before twisting this into a life lesson, like mothers instinctually do. A sweetener to gloss over the hiccups. “It’s good to feel what we feel, remember?”
He nods, and I try in vain to convince myself that my tears won’t screw him up.
Thankfully, Ryker doesn’t zoom full speed into his intense posturing, making a big deal about that.
He hands me a cup of chicory coffee with a spoonful of sugar—the way I take it—and a dish of cinnamon-chip pancakes, which are my favorite, and plops down at the table with his own blueberry stack, as if all of this were completely normal. “I bet she does, buddy. We’ll work on that.”
Where the hell did he even get the ingredients for this? There is absolutely no chance that I had cinnamon chips or pancake mix. Did he shop? There wouldn’t be chicory coffee around here, so maybe he brought groceries with him. For breakfast.
Presumptuous.
It’s all a little too much, but I play along, eating my pancakes, drinking my coffee, and listening to the two of them carry on like this is how it’s always been. I should be elated to have the warmth filling our often-lonely home, but instead, I feel so … broken.
“All I want is to be the man who builds you back up.”
Moving on.“So, how is Jax? How many therapists has he gone through since I left?”
Ryker’s jaw pulses, so apparently, any mention of me leaving is a sore spot.
Noted.
