Fuck Todd, the little Farzan in an angel costume agreed.
“Yeah. Fuck Todd,” Ramin muttered to himself. He wasn’t boring. He’d prove it to Todd. Prove it to everyone.
Prove it to himself.
He reached for his phone, but it was… well, probably downstairs somewhere. He couldn’t remember. His iPad was on the nightstand, though. He punched the wrong passcode in twice, giggling at his clumsy fingers, before he finally unlocked it.
How much did flights to Italy cost, anyway?
two
Noah
Noah kept his voice even, trying to reason with his son as he pulled into his ex-wife’s driveway, but Jake was in no mood to be reasonable.
“Youpromised!” Jake wailed. His face was all red and scrunched up.
“Jakey,” Noah said, holding in a sigh. He hadn’tpromised. He hadn’t even saidyes. He’d saidWe’ll see. But lately Jake had been treating every slightly positive answer like some sort of blood oath.
This time, it was having McDonald’s for dinner.
But tonight was Angela’s night, and she had already planned for dinner. Noah couldn’t tell Jake that, though, without making Angela into the villain who’d saidno. So he was stuck.
“Sometimes plans change.”
Surprises happened. Things came up. Marriages fell apart.
That was life.
“Come on, your mom’s waiting.”
Jake huffed and got out of the car, running for the garage door to punch in the code. Noah took a deep breath and followed more slowly.
It still felt weird, sometimes—well, all the time—coming to Angela’shouse. It had beentheirhouse, before the divorce. Angela had suggested selling it and splitting the money, but Noah had insisted she keep it. She’d been the one paying the mortgage, after all. She’d been the family breadwinner, being a partner in a law firm, while it had made more sense for Noah to stay home with Jake.
Now he had his own little apartment, and he’d taken up carpentry again, but he insisted Angela keep their old house so Jake could have at least a little stability.
By the time Noah made it to the kitchen, Jake had already blazed through the house and up to his room.
“Hey, Noah,” Angela said, pulling him in for a side hug without spilling her coffee.
Angela Russo—she’d kept her name when they got married for professional reasons, so she’d never had to change it back after the divorce—was a head shorter than Noah, soft and fat, with her brown hair pulled back into a tight power ponytail. She had mischievous blue eyes and a bright smile she’d passed on to Jake—when he wasn’t mad about McDonald’s, at least.
“Hey.” He dropped the hug and looked around the kitchen. It was still more or less decorated the same, though Angela had bought a set of purple-enameled cookware after Noah moved out. A big Dutch oven was on the stove, bubbling away with something that smelled…
Goodmight’ve been too generous, but edible, certainly.
Noah had always been the cook in the family. He’d had to learn early on.
“Go ahead,” Angela said, resigned.
“What?”
“Say it.”
“I wasn’t going to say anything.”
Angela quirked an eyebrow. Noah shook his head and pressed his lips together.
