“It’s all just a game to him. If I like you, he thinks I’ll fall back in love with him. You’re him thirty-five years ago. You look like him. You act like him?—”
“Am I going to find out he’s my long-lost daddy? You got pregnant at the wrong time. To avoid a scandal, you gave me up for adoption, but now you’re trying to make things right with me?”
When she doesn’t answer, I glance at her. Sadness lines her face.
“Shit. I’m joking. But am I right?” For a moment, anger boils up from the pit of my stomach to my throat, cutting off my next breath. For years I’ve imagined what I’d say to my biological parents if I ever met them. Did she used to have long, black hair?
“No.” She shakes her head. “I don’t mean it in a literal sense. Sorry.”
“Sorry?” I refocus on the road. “What do you have to apologize for?”
“I’m sure it’s a sensitive subject. And I didn’t mean to bring up your past in that way. We’re not your parents. We would never do that to a child.”
“I’ve got June,” I say.
“Yes,” she says slowly.
I shrug. “I’ve got June. That’s all that matters. Had my parents not abandoned me, had I not gone through all that I did, I wouldn’t have gotten this job. And this job led me to June.”
She leans her head back and closes her eyes. “Flynn?”
“Yeah?”
“You’re a good man.Juneis the lucky one. Don’t ever forget that.”
What. The. Fuck?
Pilates is nothing more than women gathering to stretch on wonky machines while listening to Chappell Roan, Sabrina Carpenter, and Taylor Swift. They compliment each other on their “cute” workout wear and go for foo-foo coffee drinks afterward.
“Are you coming tomorrow?” one of the women asks me after class as they all gather around me in a circle. It’s worth mentioning this class is only older women. They look great, but they’re all old enough to be my mother. However, they love my unitard.
“He’ll absolutely be here,” Callie says. “And we’ll get you something a little less revealing to wear. Something less distracting.”
“Callie?” The instructor stops us. She squeezes Callie’s hand. “I’m so glad you’re back. We’ve missed you.”
She returns a half smile. “Thank you, Tracey.”
“If you ever want to talk—” Tracey says.
“I’m good, but thank you.” Callie continues toward the exit.
I don’t say anything on the drive home until we’re halfway to the house. “Why do you need a muse?”
“I don’t.”
“Why does Mr. Rawlings think you need one?”
“I told you. He thinks I need to fall back in love with him, but that’s not the problem. Marriages go through many seasons. Ours is in winter. It’s been a long winter.”
“So you haven’t been to Pilates because your marriage is in winter?”
“Sort of.” She keeps her gaze out the window.
“I don’t understand,” I say.
“It’s complicated.”
“Are you saying I can’t handle complicated? My whole life has been complicated.” I slow down to let ducks cross the road toward the lake.
