“I’ll be the judge of that,” she retorts. “You spent the last ten years without sugar, so you don’t really have the perfect palate for that.” I can’t help but laugh and it interrupts Jagger again, who unlatches and looks over at me. He squirms in her arms and she pulls down her tank top before getting up and handing me Jagger, who now has his fist in his mouth as he gives me a gummy smile.
“Hi, my chonker,” I coo softly, kissing his neck before looking at the table, seeing there are pictures scattered all over. “Did you have a good afternoon?” I ask him and he gurgles at me. I turn and place him on his back in the middle of his activity mat. He knows right away to kick his feet to hear the piano by his feet sing the music. “What are all these?” I cross my legs and pick up a picture of an office.
“That—” Ariella starts, taking one of the containers out. “You brought me a half-eaten cinnamon bun?”
I laugh at her face. “No, that’s for me after. I brought you a whole new one. One for Jaxon also, so you don’t have to share.”
“You love me!” she shrieks, turning to grab a fork and then coming back to sit on the floor next to Jagger. I watch her take her first bite and see her eyebrows go up at the same time her eyes go big. “Okay, this is good,” she praises mid-chew and I laugh at her looking at the pictures. “That”—she points to the pictures with her fork—“is for the office I’m designing. Actually, I was going to talk to you this morning about it.” She used to do marketing with social media but always dabbled in design. She decided to get her interior designing degree while pregnant. Now she just does that and she makes her own hours.
“You need help designing?” I snort. “My whole house was cream and beige.”
“No.” She shakes her head. “It’s for the new foundation that I had a meeting with the other day. Helping women and children leave toxic and abusive families. Really small for now,” she says. “One person works there, and they’re looking for someone else.”
“Okay,” I say, unsure of why she is telling me this.
“I think you should apply for the job.” She puts the roll to the side as “Mary Had a Little Lamb” plays in the background.
“What?” I ask, shocked, not sure I really heard her.
“You can help people like you, who don’t know what steps to take. Why don’t you go on the website and see what their mission statement is?”
“I don’t know.” She gets up and walks over to the front door as I look down and see how bright and colorful she is making this office. She comes back a couple of seconds later and hands me a card. I look down and see K. Hayes and her phone number under it. The name of the foundation is in the middle of the card, Make the Choice. “I haven’t had a job in over ten years.”
“You have nothing to lose,” she tells me, taking another bite of her roll. “You apply for the job and then see if you’re a good fit. No harm, no foul.” I turn the card around, my hands shaking. “The first step is to apply. Then you see what happens next.”
“I’ll think about it,” I reply and then Jagger lets out a huge shriek and we both turn to look at him.
Later that night while I’m in bed, wearing my plush robe, I open my laptop and type in the foundation name. The website pulls up right away and I see the mission statement right in the middle of the screen.
Our Mission:
Abuse happens in all different types of environments and in different forms.
Our mission is to help people impacted by this. To help them survive and thrive through awareness and community engagement and education.
I look over at the top where the contact button is and press it, and it brings me to an email page.
I swallow down the lump as my hands fly over the keyboard composing the email.
Hello, Ms. Hayes,
I came across your website and was wondering if you were looking for anyone to help at the foundation. I would like to set up a phone call if you do have anything available.
Please feel free to contact me at any time.
Lexi Petrov
(602) 521-1002
I press send before I can take it back, then shut the top of the laptop at the same time the sound of swooshing ends, telling me the email has officially been sent. “Well, here goes nothing.”
sixteen
Kirby
I sit slouched on my couch, my feet on the coffee table in the middle of the room. The television is playing in the background. One of the shows Jaxon told me is a must watch is on, but all I have been doing for the past hour is sitting down and staring at my phone.
The text app is open to Lexi’s name, and I must have composed about a thousand different text messages in that hour. My eyes read it over and over again before I press send.
