I found her lips and said, “Yes,” against them.
“Our backyard. My babies inside of you.” I pinched her flat tummy.
She giggled again, “Baby, you’re making me horny.”
“My plan is working then,” I winked at her. “Grad school though?” I asked her wearily. That didn’t sound like her. She loved everything about teaching. She seemed like she had so much fun during her practice placements. It was good for her. It was the first time she seemed like she had a direction and was motivated since she quit skating years ago. When she talked about teaching her face lit up. She could talk for hours with a smile on her face telling stories about what the kids said each day. But if grad school was what she wanted, I didn’t want to stop her from going. I’d never stop her, even if that meant delaying the plan I had for us after I graduated.
“You want that?”
“I don’t know,” she said quietly. “I’m getting… confused about what to do.”
I paused, studying the rays of sunlight coming in from my tiny window and trying to choose my words carefully, remembering that I didn’t want to be anything like her controlling grandfather.
“You loved teaching, Jules. Plain and simple. Stick with what you love. I think you’d be making a mistake if you went in another direction. It’s up to you though, babe.” I wanted to be honest with her. “But can you promise me something?” I asked her, looking down at her serious face.
“Yes?”
“Can you just toe the line with your grandparents until I finish school and get my degree so I can whisk you away easily?”
“What does that even mean?” she laughed.
“Like don’t do drastic shit to make them hate me,” I told her. “They already want me burned at a stake.”
She formed an o with her mouth then. “Yeah, that’s probably for the best,” she laughed. “I don’t understand how they think you did my hair. You should tell them you hate it.”
“Not true, babe.”
“You think I can’t read you, Greyson Patrick Scott?” She asked with a smirk. “You hate it.”
“It’s you I love, not your hair, babe.”
She gasped and swatted my chest, “you do hate it!”
“False!” I told her, grabbing her little hips. “I thought you were horny; I’ll help you fix that.”
She collapsed in laughter against me again, and I loved it. I loved her.
Chapter Fourteen: Jules- Present
It was the first day of Canyon’s third grade school year. It’d gotten easier each year to drop him off, but this year didn’t follow suit. I packed his lunch and put a little note in it wishing him a good day, gave him a cheery smile, and hugged him tight before he ran off into line with his friends, but as soon as I got back in the car, I bawled my eyes out.
I drove the three miles home in an absolute mess and then sat in my driveway for twenty minutes looking at pictures of him that I'd taken this past summer. I was pathetic. I needed to get some friends or a job or something. Canyon was my little person and we’d grown even closer this summer now that Kevin was barely in the picture.
Kevin showed up every other weekend and took him out for ice cream or watched the games that he had that weekend, but he wasn’t a supportive dad. He always criticized Canyon to me thinking that Canyon couldn't hear what he was saying. Kevin obviously didn’t realize how intuitive his child was, and then he’d wonder why his “own son was giving him a cold shoulder” and if I had turned his son against him.
I stared up at my house. It was a lovely home. Not too small, not too big, all modern farmhouse looking with brick painted white and wood shutters and accents, just outside of downtown, and at the end of it a cul-de-sac. I loved it. It was my first and only big purchase after the divorce. What an absolute joke of a marriage. It was more of a financial tie than a marriage.
I had wanted to leave him long before the divorce, but I would’ve lost everything. And let’s face it- something I realize I have to admit to someone aloud one day according to my therapist - I was scared of him. But my grandparents had made sure I’d stick it out with him regardless of my feelings and well-being, all to avoid embarrassment at the hands of their country club friends. Pathetic. I wondered how they felt about Kevin choosing to leave me. I don’t think they thought about that potential scenario, I thought snidely.
After I had found out I was pregnant with Canyon, my grandfather promptly cut me off and then gifted his business to his right-hand man in the company: Kevin. Which meant they gave all their assets over to Kevin instead of having him pay them off… they had enough money to live off, and they called the business my inheritance. But that meant all my inheritance - even what my father had penned to me before his death- was tied up and gifted to this shit of a man, and I couldn’t do anything about it. I’d have nothing if I left him. I’d lose the only gift my father had ever given me. But they were already embarrassed to have a knocked-up granddaughter. An unmarried one or one who left her baby daddy instead of marrying him would be an even greater disgrace in their eyes. What would they tell everyone? I was 22 and had no form of income and hadn’t even started my career. Who was going to hire a first-year teacher who would only be there half the year? What could I do but stay with him? I had no choice if I wanted to protect my baby.
Turned out, Kevin leaving was the best thing that could’ve happened. Because of it being his choice, he had to give me half of everything in the settlement. That was plenty enough for Canyon and I to have a fresh start.
The divorce settlement this past spring was less than messy. Kevin did not even try to get custody of Canyon, which was all I would’ve fought him on. He did drop hints throughout that he was doing me a favor by not fighting for it and the threat that he would fight if I did anything less than acceptable as a mother in his eyes was always there.
I needed to start a life for myself though. I couldn’t just hide out in my house when Canyon was gone.
I needed to do something with my time. Getting a job would be better than hanging around here. I hated how lonely and pointless I felt with Canyon gone at school.
