“Yes. Otherwise, you’d just text me,” she mumbles. That’s probably the truth, I admit.
“I’m trying to live and not be scared.”
“Yeah, because that’s not cryptic at all,” she deadpans and I laugh again.
“My in-laws are coming next weekend to take the kids for Friday night. Are you on shift at the hospital?” I ask.
“No, but I’m supposed to bartend at Shifty’s on Friday night.”
“Oh. Well, crap.”
“What’s going on?” she asks, and I can sense she’s sitting down, as if worried about what’s coming next.
“They want me to go to a hotel for the night, just to get away for a few hours. I was going to see if you wanted to have a girl’s sleepover with me?” I ask hurriedly. “Junk food and swoony romcom movies and boozy drinks?” Without needing to feed Bea for a whole night, I’ll be able to actually indulge in an adult beverage. It’s the small wins, I guess. “I’m going to drag Scottie with me, too.”
Vi laughs and says, “Oh hell yes. My parents will have Hollie anyway. I’ll tell Lou we need to switch one night next week. Ugh, yes. One hundred percent yes. Girl’s night in,” Violette sing-songs, and I grin. “No babies, no men. I’m so down.”
Yep, this is going to be great. Just what the doctor—err, mother-in-law—ordered.
“How’s the move going?”
My brother Zach just grumbles from the other end of the line and I barely make out the words ‘Barbies for days’. I chuckle. He’s got three daughters—my nieces—all ranging in age from almost five to eleven. My brother was always the ‘guys guy’ type of dude, so having three daughters has been an adjustment for him.
Add on top the fact that their mother just up and left—the flighty bitch that she is—he’s got his fucking hands full being a single dad. They just moved from their old house into a smaller apartment, something he can afford easier on his own, but that alone is another big adjustment. I feel for him, that’s for damn sure.
“It’s amazing how much shit accumulates over time,” he grumbles. “And god forbid we get rid of any of these mismatched Barbie shoes. Chloe damn near had a meltdown when she saw a handful of them in the trash yesterday. You’d think I killed her kitten with the way she glared at me.”
I laugh out loud, folding my arms over my chest and leaningback in the patio chair out back. I can only imagine the betrayed look on my youngest niece’s face.
“There’s just so much shit to go through,” he sighs, and I hate the exhaustion that I can hear through the phone. “I did find something. I have it in the mail for you.”
“Yeah? What’s that?”
“It’s a letter from Dad, actually,” he says, and my entire body stills. “He sent both me and Joel letters years ago, and this one is addressed to you. I just never got around to sending it back to you. Sorry, brother.”
A letter from my dad? A letter that he wrote and meant for me to have before he died, or after?
“When did you get those letters?” I ask, leaning forward in my chair and bracing my elbows on my widespread knees.
“Shit, it was—” he blows out a breath, “—six, seven years ago? It was before we got pregnant with Chloe, I know that. I think Bailey was one, maybe? So, a while. I don’t know how yours ended up in my stuff, and then it just got buried.”
“Did uh—did you read it?”
“Nah,” he says quietly, and I nod even though he can’t see it. “If yours is as personal as mine was, I didn’t think it was my place to read it. I sent it a couple days ago, so it should be to you any day now.”
Fuck. A letter from my dad, written before he died. How strange will it be to read something from him, knowing he’s gone now? Knowing he would be gone shortly after that letter was intended to be read?
That familiar pang of grief hits me all over again, deep and aching. The grief doesn’t come as often as it used to, but time hasn’t seemed to dull that pain any. My dad was a force to be reckoned with; an amazing father, fair and honorable leader and boss, and one of my best friends. Fuck, losing him was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to go through. Weeks and months of emptiness that just ate at me mercilessly. It took a longdamn time to come out of that darkness that losing him had sent me into.
I drank too much. Fucked too much. Put myself in dangerous situations on purpose like I had some ridiculous death wish or something. And then that fog had cleared and I realized what a fucking disappointment I would have been to my father if he could have seen me then.
I’d clawed my way out of that and hadn’t looked back. I still drink—probably too much on occasion—but I’m aware enough to know when I’ve had enough. I don’t stick my dick in any willing piece of ass anymore—though I am glad even in my lowest of lows I never, not once, fucked a chick without a condom. Wrapped my shit up airtight.
I don’t need any accidental kids out there in the world.
“How’s Abigail?” I ask gruffly, pulling myself out of the darkness my train of thought had derailed me into.
Zach sighs again, and I can just imagine the way he’s rubbing at the back of his neck like he’s trying to knead the stress out of his shoulders. “She’s struggling,” he admits quietly. “I don’t blame her. She’s old enough to understand that Brit left and I can only bend the truth so much for her like I can with Bails and Chloe. I think part of her blames me for her mom leaving.” I hear the sadness in his voice, but he continues before I can interrupt. “Chloe is an emotional mess. I mean she’s always been shy and sensitive, but fuck, man. I look at herjustwrong and she starts crying. Asking if I’m going to leave them like Brittanee did. It breaks my fucking heart. How do you leave your kids?”
