“Of course. I’m going,” he takes a few steps, then turns back to me. “May I?”
“Go.”
He follows her quickly as I shake my head defeatedly: this poor boy will never survive Skylar. She’ll swallow him whole.
I slide my hand into my pocket to type out another message, then tell myself it’s best to leave it until I see her. I head over to the fridge and open it up to see what’s on offer. Seeing as I told my mother I’d take care of dinner tonight, I’m slightly concerned by the lack of food in there. She had a council meeting this evening, and told us not to wait for her – she’ll have eaten already with her colleagues – so I, stupidly, told her not to worry.
I don’t think I’ve ever made a worse decision.
I’ve made spicy chicken and baked potatoes: one of my specialities, because it’s one of the only things I know how to cook. My daughter doesn’t seem to be enjoying it much, while Carter hasn’t torn his eyes from his plate. I don’t know if he’s just hungry or if he’s scared of meeting a certain someone’s gaze. It’s just the three of us tonight – my father grabbed a quick sandwich before heading back into the fields to finish up a few things. I think he was just making the most of Mum not being here, using it as a convenient excuse not to sample my questionable cooking.
“Is it that bad?” I ask the kids.
Skylar shrugs as Carter shakes his head.
“I’m not exactly a chef, but I didn’t think I was that bad.”
“If I hadn’t stayed here with you, I’d have had a frozen pizza.”
“You wouldn’t order a takeaway?” Skylar asks, shocked.
“We live a little outside of town. No one will deliver to us.”
“Loser,” my daughter mutters. I’m starting to feel bad about the way she treats him.
“And your dad gets home late?”
“More or less at sunrise, but only two weeks out of the month. The other two, he does the morning shift.”
“What times does he work then?”
“He leaves the house at four a.m.”
“Wow, that’s rough,” I comment.
“As if you know what that feels like,” my daughter says.
“Hey, look. I always had to get up early for training. And I had to watch my diet, my…” I stop before I say too much.
“What?” Carter asks, curious.
“It doesn’t matter,” I say, shutting down the conversation. I can’t say that I had to watch the women I was seen with. If Carter hasn’t read those bloody news reports yet, like everyone else, then he’d lose any thread of respect he has for me. He’s the only person who doesn’t look at me as if all that respect has disappeared.
“And where’s your mum?” My brazen daughter asks. I think her sense of subtlety must be buried somewhere deep inside her – in the soles of her shoes, maybe.
“She left when I was born.”
Silence falls over the table. My daughter’s heart of stone could end up hurting poor Carter.
“Did she die?”
Jesus Christ, does she have to be so direct? I should have stopped her before she could say any more.
“She didn’t want me.” He shoves some chicken into his mouth and chews slowly. “She got pregnant when she was eighteen, and didn’t want a baby. She wanted to give me up for adoption.”
“Then what happened?”
“My fatherdidwant me.”
