“That’s gon’ be ugly,” she says with a frown.
“Averi,” I scold. “That’s not nice.”
“Sorry,” she mumbles.
“It’s cool. I’m gon’ show you my skills,” he says before nudging her lightly. She looks up and watches as he uses the wire dipper to only submerge random parts of his egg into each cup. Once he’s done, he has a unique sort of tie-dyed egg that Averi absolutely loves. “You like it?” he asks her.
“Yes. I should have done mine like that,” she says.
“I’m not good at decorating these so you can have it and hook it up,” he says while gently laying it in front of her.
“Thank you,” she gushes.
For the next twenty minutes, they decorate all the eggs with either stickers or the wraps. When they are finished, we have a carton full of eclectic but beautiful eggs to hide and find.
“Go put on your sneaks while Xai and I hide the eggs,” I tell them after I’ve cleaned up the island counter.
When they take off down the hall to their room, I step to him, throw my arms around him, and kiss him with all the passion in my body. “Thank you so much. They had a blast,” I tell him.
“Me too, actually. That was my first time doing that,” he admits and I immediately think back to what he said about growing up fast.
“So I popped your cherry,” I say and his entire handsome face frowns at my word choice. Laughing, I quickly add, “That just means you did something new with me.”
“Straighten me,” he scoffs playfully then shakes his head. “Where we hiding these eggs?” he asks.
“In the backyard. It’s not gon’ take long, and once we’re done, we’re having mini pizzas, cheese quesadillas, and catfish nuggets, all their requests,” I tell him. “On Easter, I order whatever they want. This selection isn’t as bad as last year though.”
“I can eat that,” he says with a smile.
He grabs the eggs and we walk out of the glass door to the backyard and hide them. I grab the girls and they barrel out into the yard with their little egg hunt baskets. Between clues from me and direct locations given by Xai, they find all of the eggs in about thirty minutes and we go inside and order dinner.
I woke up this morning with my mom heavy on my heart and mind. This day is all her. With her working at the Blue Mountain resort, holidays off were rare because hotels never close. Weonly had Christmas and Easter, so both days were coveted. The ears, eggs, hunt, and potluck takeout are all her original ideas. As a child, I thought potluck takeout was the best thing ever, and once I became a mother, I finally understood she just didn’t want to cook on her day off.
So much of me is her and I’m honored to carry on my traditions with her with my girls. This morning, it just hit me like an eighteen-wheeler that she wasn’t here with usthisEaster and I lost it. In my bathroom, under my hot shower, I cried. My tears flowed and mixed with the water from my shower head as I processed my still hard to believe reality. However, for my babies, when the shower stopped, so did my tears. I swallowed them and willed myself to push through this day.
And then, he came.
Xai brought my babies baskets and put huge, beautiful smiles on their faces. He wore the bunny ears, colored eggs with them, made Averi her favorite one, hid eggs for them, then helped the girls find them. He ate our unconventional food and appeared to enjoy it all. Not only did I hate to see him leave, so did they. We’re in their room now and even Averi is still talking about him.
“Is Xai coming back tomorrow?” Averi asks.
“No, not tomorrow, but he’ll be back,” I tell her.
“I like him,” she announces.
“Me too, Mommie,” Romi quickly co-signs.
“Good because I like him too.”
After getting them bathed and in bed, I journey to my room, shower, then climb into my bed and leave my message on Momma’s voicemail about today. I tell her all about the man who’s quickly winning my heart and helping it heal.
For the last two weeks,I’ve been floating on cloud nine. Things with Xai and I are really good. Although he’s been busy with the construction at his second location, he still gives me his time and effort. At least two, maybe three times a week, he eats lunch with me and he’s had dinner with me and the girls a few times. And when I mentioned the Music Festival and meeting Kandi, not only did he agree to go, but he bought four tickets with VIP access.
He's everything and I’m finding myself falling.
A light chime on my laptop pulls me from my thoughts of Xai. I have an IM from the front desk, so I unlock my screen.
Kera: You have a visitor.
