4. Logan
logan
Smiling with a wide grin, my daughter completes her lines. “And I have found Demetrius like a jewel, mine own and not mine own.”
“Wow.” I give her a little clap and sit back in my chair. This is not the first time I’ve sat and watched her rehearse a play for school, but it sure as hell was the longest one.
“Did I do okay?” She nervously twirls her long brown hair, her too-pretty, green eyes looking at me nervously.
Lue has been doing school plays her entire life, starting as young as kindergarten when she played a fairy.
Ever since that first time she stepped foot on a stage, she’s been obsessed with everything theater. She would beg me to buy her scripts of her favorite plays when she was younger, just so she could read them and memorize them for when the time came.
She also loved doing Shakespeare plays, and when she found out that her drama teacher was doing A Midsummer Night’s Dream for the end-of-summer play, her squeal just about gave me a heart attack.
“Baby, you did that perfectly.”
“Oh good.” Her cheeks rise with her excitement. Somehow, I’ve raised a girl who loves dressing up, singing, dancing, and acting, even though she was raised by me and my pack of brothers. “I’m excited about it, but so nervous I won’t get the role I want.”
“You want the more playful character, right? Helena?”
“I do. I think it’ll stretch my acting wings to do something less serious.”
Last year, her class had done Annie, where she had played Annie herself and taken it so seriously that the play had become our whole life for months.
If I never hear that soundtrack again, I would be good with it.
“Well, I think you’ve got it in the bag.” I grab the script that she gave me, something to read back to her in between her own lines, and I frown. “Think they’ll do the entire play?”
She frowns at me. “Of course. Why wouldn’t they?”
Because it was long as hell…but I just say, “No reason. Just curious is all.”
“I hope they do. I can’t wait for it to be here, but there is so much prep to do! We have to get the sets ready and the costumes! Do you think Uncle Mitch will be here to help with set design? He’s good at that.”
“I don’t know. I thought Ethan did it last year.” Ethan was a family friend and a local woodworker who builds some amazing tables, chairs, and anything else he could get his hands on.
“He did.” Lue pouts. “But I miss Uncle Mitch. ”
“Me too, hon. But you know he’s out there living his life. Rodeo is where he wants to be.”
Luella frowns briefly before she hops up out of her chair. “I’m gonna go get ready.”
“All right.”
Every week, we met at Mom’s house for family dinner. Though these days, it was usually me, Lue, and my brother Stetson. My other two brothers, Jax and Mitch, were off living their lives elsewhere, both on the rodeo circuit, just like they always dreamed.
Mom raised all of us on her own, leaving my dad when he wouldn’t stop drinking and getting into too much trouble. But it was for the best. If we hadn’t had Mom’s full attention, I don’t know what kind of trouble we would have gotten into.
Lue runs into the house, hugging my mom tightly around the waist. “How can I help?” she asks, sneaking a carrot and popping it into her mouth. My daughter is mature for fourteen, almost fifteen, and sometimes I look at her and wonder how all this time has passed already.
I am not ready for her to start high school, to get a job, to drive, to start…dating.
I shake my head. No need to be worrying about that now.
“Why don’t you go find your uncle? He’s been hiding out in the garage all evening.”
Lue nods and bounds out of the house. I step in to take the bread knife out of the block and start slicing the loaf Mom has prepared.
I look at Mom and see her focused on her own task, her hair recently permed and up in a half-up, half-down do that she’s always worn, her sweater old but comfortable.
“How are you doing, son?”
The calming effect my mom has on my nerves is kind of amazing sometimes. I don’t know what I would have done without her.
“I’m good.”
“Did you and the boys get those cattle moved like you wanted? That storm is gonna hit tomorrow, so they say.”
“Yeah, we were out there bright and early. CT doesn’t like to take chances on that.”
“That boy is gonna go far with that ranch, I can feel it for the both of them.”
I smile. “I’m glad for them. They deserve it.”
“They do,” she agrees, moving veggies to a bowl. Her voice lowers as she asks her next question. “And what happened with Thea?”
I bite my lip and finish slicing the last bit of bread. “It’s a complicated situation.”
In addition to being the best mom in the world, she is also one of my closest friends.
Without the extra sarcastic commentary from my brothers, they might be decent to talk to.
But when it’s real things that are bothering me, or things that I don’t understand when it comes to my daughter, it’s my mom that I turn to.
So, when Thea approached me a few months ago, I turned to my mom and asked her what to do.
She is also the only person who knew that my feelings are slightly more than just friendly.
“Is she okay? ”
“Yeah, she is. For now.” I had a meeting set up for us next week to work out the legal details.
“Okay, and does she need as much as she thought she did?” Mom was talking in code, which I was grateful for. The last thing I needed was Luella hearing something about me getting married and getting excited or mad.
I didn’t know how she would feel if I did something like that.
“I don’t think so. I think we have a plan.”
Mom’s hazel eyes pop up to mine, her brow raised. “Does this plan involve a ring?”
“No, Mom.” I shake my head. Though, the thought gives me serious pause. When Thea first threw this whole thing at me, I wasn’t completely opposed to it as much as I thought I should be.
The idea of marrying her wasn’t something I was scared of.
It was more the idea of it being fake that bothered me so much.
Could I fake marry a woman who didn’t want me? Who didn’t know that I have thought of her in damn near every scenario? Who I thought of constantly, who I had feelings for that I was too chicken shit to act on?
The last thing I want is to hurt our friendship, to throw a wrench in everything we’ve built between us.
“Well, that’s good. Better for that to happen naturally.” Mom gives me a knowing smile.
And there it was—the downside of your mom knowing everything about you.
“No, it’s better that it doesn’t happen at all.”
“And why the hell not? ”
“Because Lue doesn’t need me bringing a woman around and interrupting her life.”
“Oh please, that daughter of yours would love for you to have something other than her to focus on. She’s growing up. Do you know how many times she’s turned down hanging out with her friends, so you didn’t have to be alone?”
I blink in surprise, my brows meeting in the middle. “What?”
Mom nods. “Yup. I’ve heard her on the phone, saying she can’t hang out because it’s her night in with her dad.”
I brace my hand on the counter. “I didn’t know that.”
“I know. She doesn’t want to hurt your feelings.”
“I’ve never asked her to stay home instead. I wouldn’t want her to do that.”
“She does it because she knows you’re alone, honey.”
I lick my lips and sigh. “Well, I don’t want a girlfriend anyway.”
Mom barks out a laugh. “Right! I’m so sure that’s true.”
“I don’t. They’re too much work. I need to focus on Lue and the ranch. CT wants me to start showing that horse I’m training.”
My mom looks at me in surprise. “You? Show?”
Giving her the evil glare, I say, “I can show.”
“Sure, so long as your shirt is made out of terrycloth.”
Okay, so it is true I tend to get nervous when showing horses, which is why I preferred to start with the young ones and train them up for people like Dani and CT to show themselves.
“Aren’t we supposed to conquer our fears?”
“Oh, like trying to date the woman you’ve been infatuated with for years?” Her retort is quick, and the smirk that follows tells me that she knows she got me.
I rub a hand over my head. “Are you always this persistent?”
“When I see my sons doing something stupid? Damn straight I am.”
And that right there is why you don’t ever try to bullshit Didi Cash.
All through dinner, I think about what Mom said about Lue ditching her friends to hang out with her dad. It makes me feel awful, and I vow to myself to do something about it.
Even if I lie a little to give her a little room to breathe, I won’t be the parent who needs his daughter to stay home and miss out on her life because he doesn’t have one.