“Your mom is doing everything to keep your family stable when I go,” Jack continued. “It’s hard for everyone, but it’s our job to make people feel better. Not make them sad.”
April held Lola tight against her.
“You should apologize to her,” Jack said in a way that would’ve made anyone apologize for anything. “Because we all know she loves you.”
April turned back, away from the window, the original wave of threatening tears ebbing.
“Sorry,” Harmony mumbled. “I still don’t see why Jack has to leave.”
“He just told you, dummy,” Rohan said, elbowing his sister in the ribs.
“Hey.” April pointed to her son. “Not acceptable.”
“Mommy,” Lola whispered in her ear.
“One second, baby.” April moved closer to the sofa, standing right next to Jack to address her eldest. “He has a job and a life in California. We have a life here. He’s done what he came here to do, so we have to keep moving forward.”
That was the only way.
She glanced at Jack. For what? Maybe help? She wasn’t sure—not really.
Jack apparently found the floor super interesting. He cleared his throat like he was about to say something, but the ensuing silence said everything.
Her throat thickened, and she gulped. There would be no promises that they could go visit him, and she couldn’t promise he’d be back to visit them. He was like the Mary Poppins of influencers. He came. Then he left. That’s how it had to be.
How could she possibly ask for more? She couldn’t. She wouldn’t.
She. Would. Do. This. By. Herself.
The kids always had FaceTime. That had to be enough, because she had to do the rest of this for her. The best thing was a clean break.
Clean breaks were easier to mend.
At least, that’s what she used to believe. After the whole Kent clean-break thing, perhaps she shouldn’t be so convinced. The vasewasreally pretty.
“We’ll miss you,” Rohan said without even so much as a ribbit. He’d firmed his chin, and that little show of fortitude made April want to give him a medal for being so mature about this.
Jack stood, his gaze traveling to Lola, Mayonnaise, and then resting on April.
He was leaving, so his eyes settling on her should not have felt like a warm, weighted blanket of comfort. Yet it did.
Fixing this. That’s what he was doing for her. Filling her life with gold to hold it together.
“I’m lucky I got to meet you, and stay with you, and build a frog habitat, and hear Harmony’s song.” He held up his hand for a high five.
Rohan obliged.
Harmony crossed her arms exactly like Jack had after her announcement that April made everybody leave.
He held his hand to her for a high five. She did not take the bait.
“This is bullshit,” Harmony ground out instead.
April’s mother instincts clicked into play, overshadowing her questions of all her current choices.
“Harmony.” The word was steel plated. “We do not talk like that in this family.”
Don’t get her wrong, a lot of life was total bullshit. But Harmony could not go around just announcing that like she wasn’t eight years old.
