“Let’s get her changed,” Zara urges, pulling her toward our bedroom. I watch her go and then turn to look at everyone. Zara comes out a couple minutes later. “You can go and get changed also,” she tells me. “I think she’s still in shock.”
I walk to the bedroom and open the door and stick my head in. She’s sitting on the bench in front of our bed. “You okay?” I ask her, walking into the room and she looks up at me with tears running down her face. “Baby.” I squat down in front of her.
“You planned that party?” she asks me and I look at her. “Like, you called Sofia.”
“Well, I couldn’t exactly plan a party like this without help.” I smile at her and put my hand on her cheek.
“But you called her?—”
“Your mother gave me her number,” I cut in.
“You called my mother?” she asks, sobbing.
“Baby,” I say. “Lexi.” I kiss the top of her head as she cries.
“Do you know how big that was?” she asks me, wiping away her tears with the back of her hand.
“No.” I laugh. “I just figured it would be a nice thing to do.”
“No, Kirby.” She finally stops and smiles through her tears. “For ten years I can count on one hand how many times he spoke to my family.” I look down at the floor. “For ten years I’ve had birthdays that he would sometimes forget, and then other times make a big deal about it just in front of people. But never…” She shakes her head. “Never did he reach out to my family to invite them to one.” Her bottom lip quivers. “So you have given me in one day what he never gave me.” She leans forward and kisses my lips. “You accept them, craziness and all, and never, ever back down.”
“Baby, they make you happy,” I finally say. “They are a part of you, of course I accept them. They may not like me half the time, but it’s not about me, it’s about you. It’s about making you smile. It’s all about you, baby.”
“I really want to do dirty things to you right now.” She gets up and I shake my head. “But my whole family is in your house.”
“Our house,” I remind her. “It’s our house.”
“That whole sentence, and that is the only thing that bothered you about it.” She shakes her head. “My whole family is here.”
“Almost,” I tell her. “Couple couldn’t come because they were playing, like Dylan and Michael. But they said they are going to help celebrate you this summer.”
“Kirby Materson,” she says my full name, “I love you so much. You are too good for me.”
“Oh please. Go get changed. They are waiting for you.”
She nods her head as she rushes to the bathroom, where I know her aunt Zara hung up the dress she bought her. She is in and out of the shower by the time I head back in there. I’ve showered and I’m sliding on my black dress pants when she walks into the room. “Can you zip me?” She holds the dress to her chest, and I kiss her shoulder before zipping her up. She turns and I take her in. Her hair is parted down the middle, very much like the first time I met her. The dress is strapless and black and hugs her every single curve. It looks like it dips in the front, showing off just a touch of skin. It goes until her mid-calf, but there is a slit on her left side that goes all the way to the middle of her thigh. Silver beading starts at the left hip and moves all the way up diagonally and then forms a flower that takes over the whole right side where her breast is. She has diamond earrings that hang down to her shoulders, and she is wearing her black strappy heels that I love. “How do I look?” she asks me and I slip my jacket on and smile at her.
“More beautiful than I’ve ever seen you look,” I answer her honestly. “You have a lightness in your eyes now that radiates all over your face, and I plan on spending my days making sure that the look never goes away.” I grab her hand in mine and kiss the top of it. “Now let’s get out there, shall we?”
“I’m so excited,” she chatters when we walk out of our bedroom and she is giddy like a kid in a candy store.
I get to the steps that lead to the party and I whistle so I can get everyone’s attention. All eyes come my way when I say, “I present to you the newly divorced but still not single”—I wink at her, holding up the hand I’m holding—“Lexi Petrov.”
epilogue
Lexi
Seven months later
“So, as of Monday they will start painting the walls,” Cheryl says, her voice is filled with excitement and amazement. “It’s so pretty and it was such a cool idea to do the shelter in one of the abandoned churches with an attached school.”
Once the divorce papers were signed, the first thing I did was put the apartment up for sale, and it sold in three days, going over asking price. I smiled the whole time. As soon as I put the house on the market, my realtor told me about a space that had just become available. It was built to be a church, but they ran out of funding. Which meant that I went in with a lowball offer, and it was approved the very same day. It was as if it was meant to be.
The minute I got the keys, I flew down there to do a walk-through with a construction team and hired a project manager to oversee it since I wasn’t going to be living there. He was a dream come true, and Cheryl has been the biggest help of all.
“I figured we can even do an after-school program for the children in the area,” I fill her in with another section I plan to add once we get up and running, “but for now it’ll be a safe haven for those who need it.”
“I’ve reached out to the shelters that are in the area and told them about what we are doing. They were floored we are so advanced already. They said they were turning away up to fifty people a week.”
