26. Hayden
Chapter twenty-six
Hayden
I screwed up, and I know it.
So, the next day, I leave the office early. I made an excuse about a dental appointment, and head out towards Luna’s school.
Perfect. And just as expected . Addie’s car is parked right out front with the rest of the parents waiting for pickup.
When I see Luna’s bright pink coat leaving the brick building, I get out and head over.
My heart is racing as I approach them. I stay back a moment while they hug each other and catch up on their days. But when there’s a lull in their conversation, I step forward and say a friendly, “Hello.”
There was a smile on Luna’s face, but it slowly falls flat after turning around and seeing that it’s me who is standing there.
The same could be said for Addie, her mother. Although, the contentious look on her face is further emphasized with an arched eyebrow.
“What are you doing here?” she asks, folding her arms and pursing her lips.
I hold my hands up. “I—I just wanted to say sorry for last night.”
She tilts her head in the child’s direction.
Right.
I bend over and after looking down at the ground for a minute, I question, “Will you accept my apology?”
“What are you apologizing for?” she quips. By the cheeky look on her face, I realize another thing she inherited from her mother—the pleasure of making people work for anything and everything.
In response, Addie just chuckles.
They really are two peas in a pod.
Taking all of that in, I sigh, but then continue, “For acting terribly last night. I shouldn’t have raised my voice. I promise it wasn’t your fault. I had a bad day at work. But that’s still no excuse. I’m so—”
Suddenly, a voice I thought I tuned out forever comes booming in my head. It’s my father’s and is saying, “Don’t apologize. Just do better.” It was an ironic thing to come from the mouth of a man who had a lot to apologize for. But I found the sentiment to be true, nevertheless.
Taking her tiny hands, I repeat the phrase.
Her quizzical look tells me she doesn’t understand exactly what I’m saying, so I decide that I better show her rather than tell her.
“Can he come to the pier with us, Mommy?” she then asks.
Oh! That has to be a good sign. Although she shied away from my touch at first, she’s now inviting me to join them on an afternoon excursion.
“You sure?”
She bites down on her lip and nods.
Addie inhales through her nose sharply and shrugs her shoulders. “Fine. Hayden, would you like to come with us to the pier?”
“I’d love to,” I respond without missing a beat. The truth is that I have a mountain of work to attend to, but this is more important. “Let me just—hold on.” I take out my phone, message my assistant with a make-believe story about molar extractions, and then slide it back into my back pocket.
“All set?” asks.
“Yep. Let’s do this.” I offer to drive my car, but she insists that she’d prefer to.
“Luna’s car seat is already installed—”
“Mom!” She stomps on the ground with her teeth clenched. It’s obvious she doesn’t want any of her school friends to overhear about her protective seating.
“I’m sorry.” Addie “shoos” her into the car. Then, after picking at a callous and then rubbing her hands together, she asks, “Are you sure you’re ready for this?”
I swallow hard—both at the question and her natural, effortless beauty, which is in fine form today as she’s in an old soccer jersey and yoga pants.
“I’m serious, Hayden,” she insists when I don’t say anything. “We cannot have a repeat of last night. Do you understand me? I won’t have it. Consider that strike three. There won’t be any more given.”
“Yes.”
“Yes, what?”
Ugh. There it is again. I can’t just give her a blanket statement. It’s like the Flores girls are allergic to them or something.
“Yes, I understand that I can’t fly off the handle again.”
She nods. “Very good.” She’s, then, about to say something else, but her eyes avert to someone behind me.
When I turn to see what she’s looking at, I see another little girl. Except, unlike Luna, she has blonde hair that reaches past her shoulders and blunt-cut bangs.
“Hey Paige! How are you, sweetie?”
Paige. Paige. Why does that sound so familiar?
Grabbing the child by the shoulders, Addie explains, “Hayden, this is Paige. Luna’s new friend. Paige, this is Hayden. He’s our . . . friend.”
First off, I recognize now Paige is the friend Luna couldn’t stop yammering about at my place last night. And secondly, it kind of stings to still be referred to just as a “friend” of the Flores girls, but I also understand it. Especially after “the incident.”
“Nice to meet you, Paige.”
“Uh-huh.” She doesn’t seem all that impressed with me, but not many little girls are. Younger boys, on the other hand, can’t get enough of me. Not her. Instead, she seems eager to join Luna in the back.
“Paige!” Luna calls out after Addie opens the back door again.
I guessed, based on sight alone, I thought that Paige was taller than Luna. But my suspicion is confirmed when she hops in without needing a car seat.
However, unlike Luna may have been concerned, her friend doesn’t tease her.
Someone raised her right.
Addie and I then follow suit and get in.
Adjusting the mirror, she looks back at them and asks, “Are we all buckled in, ladies?”
I realize that I’m not, and I secure it across my shoulders.
“Alright, let’s go.”
***
It’s a short drive to our location. So after she parallel parks better than I could’ve ever dreamed of doing, we all jump out.
“This stall has the best ice cream,” Paige says while nudging Luna’s shoulder.
She looks up with her green eyes and asks, “Can we, Mom?”
Addie sucks air in through her teeth. “Ice cream before dinner? I don’t—”
“Please!”
“Oh, alright. Just this once!”
The girls both cheer and run off.
“Stay close!” Addie yells after them.
When we catch up, Luna goes for pistachio, and her friend elects for banana.
Banana ice cream? What in the world?
The silent judging on Luna’s face mirrors my own. But she doesn’t say anything—as she, too, was raised well.
As they happily lick on their cones ahead of us, Addie and I walk behind. While Luna’s forgiveness was somewhat easily obtained, I already knew her mother would be a harder sell.
“I am sorry, you know. Deeply.”
“I know.” She faces forward and doesn’t so much as glance my way.
“No, Addie.” I stop and grab her arm. She resists, but eventually faces me. “It will never happen again.”
“I’ve heard that before,” she mumbles.
My eyebrows narrow, and my shoulders slump forward. “Addie . . .” I know I’ve hurt her in the past, but I’m getting a little tired of being punished for that in the present. Although, I suppose my behavior last night was a bit of my old self coming back up.
After that, I’m lost in thought as I look over my shoulder and out at the water.
“Hayden?” she says, taking over my attention again. The wind makes it so that soft, feathery pieces of hair are blowing in her face. She shakes them off.
“Sorry, sorry.”
“What’s going on in that noggin of yours? Don’t lie. I know that face.”
Oh, boy. Before I can deny making any face, I realize that I’m biting on the corner of my cheek.
I release the thin skin from in between my canine teeth, and say, “Nothing.” The answer is a lot for me to admit to myself, nevertheless, out loud to her.
“Fine.” She turns again, and she folds her arms. “None of my business, I guess.”
“I’m just angry with myself,” I finally blurt out.
Her eyes dart to me. “Well, good. You should be. Your little meltdown was really traumatizing for Luna.”
We both look over at her laughing and twirling with her friend.
Yeah. Real traumatized. I don’t mean to negate the effect of my behavior, but she does seem rather unfazed by it all right now.
Anyway, now that I’ve started, I want to tell Addie the whole truth. “You see,” I lower my head and scratch at my neck, “I’m upset with myself for being like my dad.”
“Oh, wow.” She gasps and opens her mouth wide. “That’s—that’s heavy, Hayden. Very heavy.”
“Yeah, but it’s also the truth. I acted just like him, Addie. And that terrifies me. You know me. I’d rather die than act a single ounce like that bastard.”
After I swore, I glance to make sure the children are still far enough away not to hear me. Thankfully, they are.
“He was a real bastard,” she agrees.
“Yeah.” She is one of the few people who saw him in prime “bastard” form. “Anyway, I hate myself for acting like him, like I said.”
She clicks her tongue. “Yeah.”
What? I was hoping she would give me some words of encouragement. No, you’re nothing like him, Hayden. Or something like that.
“That’s it then?” I inquire.
“Well? I did see some similarities between the two of you last night.”
Ugh. Somehow, her saying that is so much worse than me admitting it in my head.
“I’m sorry.” She shakes her head. “But it’s true.”
Fine. “Well, I’m sorry. I promise I’ll do better in the future.”
“Don’t apologize. Just do better.”
I didn’t know she ever heard him say that. Or did she?
Nonetheless, I look down and fiddle with my fingers. “Right. You’re absolutely right. Absolutely right. That’s what I’ll do. I will do better, Addie. I’m not going to squander away my opportunity to have a relationship with her—and with you.”
In order to prove this, I flag down the kids and bring them over to a novelty T-shirt stand.
“Come on, girls. Whatever you want. It’s on me.”
Luna points to one with Ariel, as in The Little Mermaid, with a Jack Daniel’s T-shirt on and tattoos up and down her arms.
After paying for that and another innocuous one with “Los Angeles” printed on the front several times for Paige, they put them on over their clothes.
“Very nice,” I compliment as Luna spins.
With a grin still on my face, I peer over at Addie, expecting her to have a look of approval. Sure, the shirt Luna is sporting is a bit questionable , but it’s still funny.
“You can’t buy her love, you know,” she mutters through a closed mouth. “By her, I mean, your daughter.”
That sends icicles down my spine.
“Although, you’ve never fully acknowledged her as such, have you?”