Chapter 53
chapter fifty-three
Audrey
Today's vocabulary word: resolve
"Remind me why we're doing chowder in August," Jamie said, pushing her bowl to the center of the picnic table.
"I tried to warn you," I said. "You were the one who wanted to sample all three varieties."
Jamie folded her arms on the table and put her head down. "It's very rude to remind someone of their bad decisions to their face."
"Can anyone explain these things to me?" Ruth tapped her plastic fork to the side of the paper basket. "I just want to know what I'm eating. What is a jonnycake? Who is Jonny? Is he in there or is it just his ghost at this point?"
"It's a cornmeal cake," Shay said. "A thick batter cooked on a griddle. Very Rhode Island. They love a good gristmill around here."
"Not a single Revolutionary War spirit fried into this thing? What a letdown," Ruth said.
"Not to get us too far off-track," Shay said as she gathered our discarded bowls and baskets, "but it sounds like you're going to have to make some very big decisions very soon, Audrey."
I glanced across the field to where Noah and Jude stood near a row of cornhole games, drinks in hand.
They'd been stationed there for the past hour while Gennie and Percy competed in an under-ten tournament.
I wasn't sure it was a tournament so much as a few high school kids who kept rotating the players from one match to another, and never knocked anyone out of the running.
Not that we had a problem with that approach.
"I mean, maybe," I said. I knew I was hedging. I also knew it wouldn't do me any good. "I'm hoping it all just sorts itself out."
"Baby girl," Jamie drawled, her head still pillowed on her arms. "That's not a strategy. Or, it is but it's not your strategy."
"Believe me, I understand the desire to sit back and excuse yourself from making those decisions," Shay said. "Though I know you don't actually want that."
"No, I don't but— There's just so much up in the air." I shook my head. "And am I really the one making the decisions here? Doesn't Jude have to decide? He has a lot more on the line than I do."
"Debatable," Ruth said.
"Just stop for a second," Shay said. "Get out of your head and look at him over there with Noah and the kids."
"Are we looking at the shorts?" Jamie asked. "Because while I don't enjoy most shorts on most men, they're both doing it very right."
"We're not looking at their shorts," Shay said.
"But can we?" Ruth asked. "There's a lot to admire."
"We are looking at the fact that this guy came to a corn festival in a wacky little Rhode Island town in the middle of August," Shay said with a laugh.
"And then there's the fact that when his world went to shit, you were his soft place to land—and he's stayed there ever since.
Even when that involves a ridiculous festival on the hottest day of the year.
He could've left at any time. He could've taken his kid home.
He didn't." She pointed at me with her fork.
"He's made his decision. You need to make yours. "
"I just…" I yanked the elastic from my hair and started gathering the strands into a bun.
It really was unbelievably hot and we were sitting in the shade.
"I don't want to get it wrong. I'm not good at making the right choices when it's really important and I just feel like—" I blew out a breath and shook my head. I didn't know what else to say.
"You feel you'd rather make no decision than the wrong one," Shay said. "I know. I've been there. It's miserable. But not making a decision is a decision by itself."
"We'll make a list," Ruth said, pulling a pen from her bag and unfolding a napkin. "Let's start with the basics. You want to keep this thing going with him, right?"
I rolled a bottle of water between my palms. "Yeah. I do. But Jude and Percy live in Virginia, and there's a family situation in Michigan, and I work in Boston, which is just a giant mess."
"Not a mess," Ruth said as she wrote out her notes. "Just a series of options, each with their own merits and challenges."
"You could move to Virginia," Shay said. "We'd miss you like crazy but it's not like you'll ever get rid of us."
"Never," Jamie added. "We'll find you."
"Or Jude and Percy could move here," I said. It felt strange saying that out loud after thinking it for the past few weeks. Maybe because I'd been waiting for Jude to say it first.
"You've mentioned that Jude travels a fair bit for work and he has some flexibility on where he's based," Ruth said.
"You'd be able to enroll Percy in our kindergarten class," Jamie said. "Aurora's best friend is hard-of-hearing. She grew up with ASL and she's had several kiddos in her class using adaptive communication tools."
"I didn't know about the ASL," I said. "I did think about enrolling him. But he won't be five until the end of September."
"That's not a problem," Shay said. "I always had a friend or two who didn't turn five until some time in the first month or two of school. It's an independent school. The rules are different from typical public districts. I know Lauren wouldn't mind. Especially if it's your kid."
"He's not my kid," I said.
"Maybe not yet," Shay said. "But a day will come when you will know without any question that he's your baby. You'll have a hard time remembering who you were before he took over your life. And it will surprise the hell out of you but you'll be okay with that."
I didn't respond. I didn't think I could since I was busy wondering if that day had already come. Was it too soon? Was it presumptuous of me? Or unfair to Penny, who'd gotten so little time with her son? I didn't have any of the answers.
When Ruth started clicking her pen, I asked, "But what about the custody thing? What if he ends up splitting custody with the friend and has no other choice but to move to Michigan?"
"That's not going to happen," Ruth said. "Custody for the grandmother was a stretch. The friend is straight-up bananapants and I'm annoyed that his attorney hasn't made it go away."
"But let's say it does happen." Shay caught my eye, nodding. She knew that I needed to think through even the most unlikely scenarios. "Would you follow them to Michigan? Is that an option for you?"
"Or would you try to make a long-distance relationship happen?" Jamie asked.
I clasped my fingers under my chin as I considered this. "Michigan could be an option but long-distance… I don't see how we'd ever succeed at that."
Ruth clicked the pen a few more times. "Why not?"
"Just look at the drama we lived through last month," I said.
"When he's with Percy, he's completely present and he wants to keep it that way.
Maybe that was one wild situation but when he isn't traveling for work, he wants to be home with his kid.
He's not glued to his phone. He doesn't want to get on another plane to see me. "
"If he wanted to, he would," Jamie said.
"Yeah, but is that a fair rule when we're talking about a single parent who has a cancer-survivor mother to look after?
Not to mention his son's grandmother? Even if he wants to, there's still work, family, and his kid.
There's not a ton of wiggle room. And our school calendar isn't flexible.
I can't take a bunch of long weekends without it turning into a problem pretty quick.
" I tapped a finger to Ruth's list. "We'd go into it with the best of intentions but come out of it withered and worse off than ever before. "
"Then we're saying no to the long-distance option?" Ruth asked. I nodded. "It sounds like we're also dropping the Michigan option to the bottom of the list?"
"Yeah. I think so." I went back to staring at Jude and Noah.
They seemed to be having a good time, even in the blazing sun.
They probably had a lot in common, at least on the unexpected fatherhood side.
Also the complicated family matters side.
And we couldn't forget about the fake wife and fiancée angle either.
If Jude stayed, they'd be friends. Gennie and Percy would grow up as cousins, sort of. Shay and Jamie, Ruth and Emme would become part of their family.
I knew he could be happy here with me, even if it upended his world. Picking up his kid and moving wasn't a small feat. He'd have to be completely invested in me for that. I wanted to believe he was but it wasn't hard to tell myself the other end of that story.
"Too bad Grace and Ben aren't here," Shay mused.
"She'd love the whiskey," Jamie said.
"And he'd love hanging with the dads," I said.
Shay smiled at me. "They'll have plenty of chances. We do have the Spooky Stroll coming up sooner than you'd think. And don't forget about the Thanksgiving Fox Trot."
"Don't talk to me about running right now," Jamie said, an arm banded over her belly. "Or any other time."
"Are you one of those people who asks on the first date if his family does holiday fun runs?" Ruth asked. "And if he says yes, you walk out immediately because marrying into that kind of family is your worst nightmare?"
"Let's get two things straight, baby cakes.
First, I don't go on dates. I've never gone on dates.
Dates are for people who want to get to know each other over expensive ramen and stilted conversation.
I want to be facedown and ass-up with a minimum of three other people who will make me forget where I am, and I don't want to learn their names. "
"My god," Ruth breathed.
"And second," Jamie went on, "marrying into any family is my worst nightmare. There's no situation that could occur on this earth that would result in me ever getting married."
"But off this earth?" Ruth asked.
"Beam me up," Jamie replied.
"Be careful. Those kinds of declarative statements are like flipping off fate," Shay said.
"I'll be fine," Jamie said. "I've been flipping off fate my whole life."
"Then maybe fate is waiting to bite you in the ass," Ruth said.
"It probably is," Jamie said. "But I don't mind a good bite."