She’s delusional. She has no idea that she’s playing with fire every time she asks him to help me. Because every time our eyes meet or his arm brushes mine, that slow, burning spark I try to ignore flares up. And for a split second, I imagine what it would be like to give in to my desire for just one night. One night where he helps me forget every responsibility and problem.
“Thanks for the reminder to add ready to be an instant father to the Safe Guy Shortlist.” I try to deflect the conversation away from Hayes.
I’d rather listen to her rant about my list with the qualities I need in a man in order to feel like he won’t hurt or disappoint me. She thinks it’s ridiculous, and maybe it is, but I like lists, and it’s a reminder that the men who can’t check off the boxes will eventually break my heart.
“God, you and that list.” I can practically hear her roll her eyes. “You’re keeping Hayes busy—think of it as you helping him.” Usually, my diversion tactics work better on Callie.
“I am not helping him, believe me. Lincoln asked him to be his rec league coach.”
She laughs but stops abruptly. “That’s perfect! Yeah, totally. He should do that.”
I wish I could live with her blind optimism. Where does she think her brother would fit that into his schedule?
“No, he shouldn’t! He’s a professional baseball player who plays 162 games a year. He’s literally home for, what, seven days this month? Then he leaves again right away—not even a full day off. He’s got a travel day, then he’s on the field the next day. He does not have time to coach a bunch of nine-year-old boys.”
“Huh. Someone’s keeping tabs on my brother’s schedule.”
I grunt, and a couple at a nearby table glance over at me. “Stop it. Everyone knows the life of a pro baseball player is demanding.”
“I don’t know,” she says. “I think he’d enjoy it.”
“You think I should let him do everything. And stop calling him to come over, all right? It’s bad enough what he’s doing on Friday… one thing just steamrolls into the next.”
“What am I missing?” she says in a singsong voice, and my head drops. That was a stupid slip on my part.
“When he was over helping me the night you overheard all the screaming in the background, which, by the way, I had handled.”
“I believe you,” she says with a laugh to say she didn’t. She might be right on that one.
“I would’ve had it handled. Sure, I might’ve had a good cry after they went to bed, but I could’ve gotten through it.”
At least the crying every time they go to bed has subsided for now.
“Well, if you?—”
I cut her off. “I started talking about this National Days thing with Monroe. Can I tell you what I’ve done this week? Hayes actually gave me a good idea—to get space ice cream for Space Day. I ordered the freeze-dried stuff. Thank God for Amazon. What did we do before Prime delivery existed?”
She laughs.
“Then there was Brothers and Sisters Day. That was easy. I took them out for ice cream. World Laughter Day? I bought a joke book, and we told jokes all night. Orange Juice Day was handled by seven o’clock that morning. It was like I won the lottery, having an entire day without that weighing me down. But of course, when he was over, Monroe brought up Nail Day.”
“That might be above his pay grade.”
“Yes, and I have to work. Then Lake wanted to go to a birthday party, but I was going to have Lake do her nails because I figured that would be the easiest. I mean, do people really take a six-year-old to a salon?” I barely take a breath, my salad long forgotten. “So yeah, Lake was going to do it because Monroe looks up to her—just like I looked up to Sky all those years.”
I pause, realizing I’m rambling. But Callie is the one person I can tell everything… well… except anything that has to do with her brother.
Still, it would be really nice to tell her that I kept seeing his eyes on my body the whole time he was over, how that sparked a sick desire inside me. Because how can I even want sex with everything going on in my life? With everything I’ve lost? Besides, I feel gross most nights after they go to bed. I’m constantly running around, sweating in areas I didn’t know could sweat. The word relaxed is a foreign concept nowadays. But then Hayes looks at me, the way his jaw tenses and his teeth bite his bottom lip, and suddenly all I can think about is sex.
“Are you lost in your head?” Callie interrupts my thoughts.
Thank God, I do not need to be in that thought realm.
“Sorry. Anyway, this is what happens to me now. Motherhood, apparently. You have all this shit in your head, and you’re shuffling through it like a stack of tax papers that you don’t understand. Just warning you.”
She laughs. “That’s a long way off for me.”
“Anyway,” I continue, “so they’re talking about Nail Day, and your brother just says, ‘I’ll take her to get her nails done.’”
