“And so many other things besides,” Emma deadpans, and my tears dissolve into wet laughter.
“Did you know we’re pen pals?”
“Shut up,” Rain gasps.
“That may be the cutest fuckin’ thing I’ve ever heard. It’s disgusting,” Emma retorts, but she’s grinning softly at me.
“What do you write about?” Rain asks, sincerity filling his voice.
“Everything, really. It’s easier to be honest in writing, you know? Oh God…”
“What?” they ask in unison.
“I’d had a bit to drink the last time I wrote him.”
“Oh my God… Spill the tea, Corey,” Emma insists.
“I may have told him about all the sexy things I wanted him to do to me,” I wince.
“You didn’t!” Rain’s voice is tight with mirth. Yeah, I know, pal.
“I did. And I walked to the postbox in my pyjamas to send it. I completely forgot until I got a voice note from him a few days later.”
“What did he say?” Emma asks, bouncing in her seat, unable to contain herself.
I think back to how Nash had growled, legit growled, at me in his voice note.
“He may have growled at me and told me I’d made him hard in front of his brothers.”
The way we laugh fills not only the whole house, but my whole heart.
“OK, so now… enquiring minds want to know. What did you ask him to do to you?” Emma asks, no boundaries, no fucks given. And I love her for it.
“Well…”
Twenty-six
Nash
July, present day
Iclose the front door behind me, having just dropped Nancy at Mum and Dad’s for the night, and one look at the chaos that is my house is enough to make me want to cry. Ignoring the toys strewn about, the dishes littering the coffee table and the dining table, and the large brown stain on the rug where Nancy accidentally spilled her hot chocolate the other day, I climb the stairs and collapse on top of my bed.
It only takes a few minutes of tossing and turning to recognise that sleeping in jeans and a button-down shirt is not going to be conducive to rest, so I haul my body, heavy with fatigue, from the bed and make my way into thebathroom for a shower.
Refreshed, I return to my bed and switch on the bedside lamp. Piling pillows behind me, I recline against the headboard, blankets kicked off slightly as my still shower-warm skin cools. My head falls back against the headboard, and I close my eyes.
I knew that being a dad would involve a lot of adjustment, and it’s not that I care all that much about mess, but I feel like I’m coming apart at the seams a little. Nancy’s behaviour has improved so much in recent weeks, and we’re like two peas in a pod. I love nothing more than reading together, playing with her café playset – she’s moved on from hairdressers, thank goodness, since Rain still hasn’t stopped crying over Aidan’s hair – and heading down to the beach where she is becoming a master of sandcastles.
But the practicalities and logistics of being a single parent are well and truly hitting home. Kids are fucking messy. She’s like a chaos gremlin who leaves stuff in her wake wherever she goes. And don’t get me started on trying to leave the house. What used to take me two minutes is now a forty-minute song and dance of last-minute toilet trips, shoelace tying because “no, Daddy, I can do it myself”, and forgottenitems.
I wouldn’t be without her, but I’m exhausted and frustrated because I can’t help but feel like I’m doing this whole thing wrong.
The faint buzz of my phone on the bedside table drags me from my thoughts, and I look at the screen, unable to quell a smile when I see Corey’s calling.
“Hi, little rabbit. How are you?”
“I’m good, Doc. How are you?”
