My eyes are open, although they feel tired and achy, along with my head. I lie in bed thinking of the conversation of last night slash this morning. Reaching for my phone, I check the time, and when it registers that it’s eight in the morning, my entire body jolts straight up.
Ryan.
He wakes up at five o’clock on the dot without failure every single morning. Throwing my legs over the side of the bed, I spring out of bed and hurry toward the guest bedroom. The pack-n-play is empty.
My heart races. It beats so hard and so fast that it’s slamming into my eardrums, pounding as I walk down the hallway in search of my son. But then everything goes silent the moment I step out of the hall and into the living room.
It goes silent because Eli is sitting on the sofa, a bowl of cereal in his hand, and Ryan is sitting on his lap, his head resting on Eli’s shoulder. They’re watching television. Shifting my gaze to the TV, I see one of Ryan’s favorite cartoons playing.
Eli turns his head, and his eyes find mine. His lips curve up into a grin. “I didn’t know what he would want to eat. He had no issue showing me. He had a banana and toast with butter. I was thinking of making some eggs, too, but I wasn’t sure.”
My heart flutters.
It absolutely flutters at this entire moment.
“Eggs are good,” I whisper. “He loves scrambled eggs.”
Eli’s lips curve up into a grin, and for a moment, I am lost. Or maybe I’m actually lost to the moment. This is a version of perfection that I didn’t realize even existed. I stay where I am, rooted in my spot as I watch them together.
Maybe Eli is right. Maybe I should move here and give this a real honest-to-god try.
Maybe it just might work out.
FIFTEEN
WRENLY
I’m notsure what to expect for the rest of the week. Eli has informed me that he has to go to practice this afternoon. Picking up my fork, I poke around at my scrambled eggs while Ryan ignores the world around him because cheesy eggs are one of his favorite things, and right now, nothing else exists.
Chewing on the corner of my bottom lip, I clear my throat as I lift my gaze to meet his. “Would it be okay if we just came and watched?” I ask.
I don’t think I want to be away from him. It’s not just because last night and early this morning were amazing. It’s because I don’t want to be alone with my thoughts. If I’m alone, I might talk myself out of trying to figure out how to move here. Going back to Texas is the most logical decision that I could make, but that doesn’t mean it’s the right one.
I can’t talk to my dad about this yet, either. As much as he wants me to make the best choices for Ryan and me, he’s also going to want us to stay with him selfishly. And because I’m scared to death about changes and the future, instinctually, I want to stay with my dad, too.
Eli’s lips curve up into a grin. “What if I called Luke’s wife, Clara? Would you guys like to maybe hang out at a park or something with her and her little girl while we’re at practice?”
I’m not sure what to say to that. I want to jump on it because any chance to have another little one for Ryan to play with is a boon. But at the same time, this is his friend, and I just know that if she hates me, that’s going to make this relationship between us even more difficult than it already is.
“She’s really nice, baby. You’ll like her.”
Clearing my throat, I shake my head a couple of times. “I’m not worried about me liking her,” I say, wrinkling my nose.
Eli snorts. “She’ll like you, too, sunshine. And Sloane will love Ryan. I’m sending Luke a text right now. No ifs, ands, or buts.”
Well, since that is that, I press my lips together and roll them a few times while I watch his fingers fly over his phone at an almost alarming rate. I’m not a big texter, mainly because I don’t really have anyone to text, but Eli seems really freaking fast.
Stabbing my eggs, I bring a bite to my mouth, sliding my fork inside as I wrap my lips around it, then slowly tug the fork back out. Chewing on the cheesy deliciousness, I wait for him to say something, hopefully that she’s busy and won’t be able to meet me today.
But he says the exact opposite. In fact, what he says is akin to sending me into the den of either snakes or bunnies itself—considering I’m not sure what I’m going to be walking into and whom I am going to be walking toward.
The whole thing makes me feel stressed, not necessarily uneasy, because if I do decide to live here, then these are the people I’m going to need to meet. The people who I’m going to need to get to know.
These are Eli’s people.
But then I can’t help but wonder if they’re all judging me, too. They wouldn’t tell him that, but what if they think I’m a bad person? That guilt crawls up my throat and threatens to choke me again.
I don’t know what to do. What to say. So I sit across from Eli, watching as he texts his friend, and I wonder if there is a flight back to Texas in the next five minutes because I’m about to spring to the airport.
