She shook her head. ‘No, the honour is all yours. You got to hear her first word and it was a good one.’ She nudged him. ‘How do you feel?’
‘Yeah, it’s pretty special.’ But his emotions began to bubble up. ‘I wish Cassie was here. It should’ve been mumma, not dadda.’ He gulped; he’d been too honest.
Geraldine put a hand on his arm. ‘I know you wish things were different. But you’re doing your best. I’m sure Cassie would’ve been proud of how you’re taking care of Eva for her.’
Noah bathed in the compliment but only for a millisecond because they both knew what tomorrow was: a second chance for Eva’s biological father to get to know her. Noah briefly hoped the guy wouldn’t show, problem solved. Last night, he’d had a dream that Paul had disappeared all over again, the way he’d done to Cassie, and Noah had taken Eva to school on her first day, walked her down the aisle when she got married.
‘I’ll leave you to it,’ said Geraldine, insightful to his emotions, knowing he’d likely need a bit of time to gather himself. She’d done it before, walked away when he had so much going on in his head, he needed a moment. He bet she was an amazing mother with her children, both when they were little and now they were adults.
But before she gathered her things, he couldn’t resist asking, ‘You don’t like him, do you?’ Her opinion mattered to him.
She zipped up her bag after taking out a set of keys. ‘That’s not for me to decide.’
‘Your opinion is all I’m asking; we’re all entitled to one of those.’
She didn’t hesitate for long and set down her bag again. ‘There’s something shifty about him. He wouldn’t look me straight in the eye.’
‘Maybe he’s shy,’ Noah teased.
‘Men like that aren’t shy; they’re brash, full of themselves. And I’m afraid I don’t think he can be trusted. Watch yourself, Noah.’ She gave Eva a little hug goodbye while she was still in Noah’s arms. ‘And watch this one.’
‘I will, don’t you worry.’
‘Trust your gut instinct. It’s important when you’re a parent.’
Her words stayed with him after she left and while he made his dinner as Eva played on her play mat, making a heck of a noise whacking a xylophone with a stick that had a big rubber ball on the end. This sort of noise had become the soundtrack of his life.
What if he was about to lose another piece of himself?
Paul arrived the next day without much fanfare at all. He seemed neither excited nor nervous; he simply turned up and came over the threshold, hands in his trouser pockets, something stuck in his teeth given the way he kept sucking at them as though trying to get it out without using his fingers. Noah supposed he should be grateful for that.
Noah offered Paul a coffee in an attempt to shake off his dislike of the man, for Eva’s sake, but when he spotted Paul’s obscene, bright-green, expensive car parked outside as if to announce his presence, Noah’s resentment and aversion towards the man came back.
‘I won’t bother today.’ Paul’s brash response reminded Noah of Geraldine’s parting words about gut instinct. ‘Can’t stop.’
The guy didn’t ask to hold Eva and he showed little interest in her this time and Noah’s feelings took a downturn from ‘dislike’ towards ‘despise and mistrust’. Something about the way he even stood here, cocky, hands in pockets as though he was sure all of this would work out for his benefit, made Noah increasingly uneasy.
‘What do you mean you can’t stop?’ Noah asked. ‘I thought you wanted to see Eva again.’
‘I do. And I have. She’s right there.’
Yep, inhisarms!
‘I’ve come to tell you that I intend to fight for custody.’
‘You told me that the last time.’ Was he going to serve papers? Already?
‘Unless…’ Paul walked back through the house from the kitchen as if he owned the place and Noah had no choice but to follow after him. ‘Unless we can come to an alternative arrangement.’ The guy had the audacity to sit in the armchair devoid of any of Eva’s toys, manspreading his thighs, sitting there as if this was his throne and he was about to lay down the law of the land.
‘Arrangement? You mean like visitation?’ Maybe this guy didn’t want full-time fatherhood and it gave Noah an immense sense of relief.
‘No, not like visitation. I mean an arrangement.’ He slapped his hands onto his knees. ‘Look, I can see you and Eve have a bond?—’
‘It’s Ev-a,’ Noah corrected, emphasis on the ‘a’.
‘You have a bond, you’re good with her.’ Was he waiting for a thank you? ‘We could take this to court and I’m sure as the biological father, I’d stand a good chance of winning?—’
Noah interrupted again. ‘Not necessarily. You buggered off and I became the legal guardian.’ He was done with being polite.
