16. Rose
Rose
“How about that?” Joel points at a bag of barbecue-flavor chips.
We have two bags of chips in our shopping cart, which is one more than I intended to grab when I wandered down this aisle. The Rios Grocery Store isn’t massive, at least not like the huge Walmart we had in Weldon, but its shelves are packed, and I’ve been able to find everything I need.
I shake my head. “You’re worse than Ben.”
I forgot how much easier grocery shopping is when I don’t have to keep half my attention on Ben while also trying to read a shopping list I made on my cell phone after I went through the pantry, refrigerator, and freezer this morning to see what we were running low on.
Ben, perched on Joel’s shoulders, gives me puppy-dog eyes. When Joel does the same, I let out a defeated sigh. “Put it in the cart.”
I’m a strong woman, at least when it comes to resisting puppy-dog eyes, but that’s too much cuteness to say no to, especially with the story of Joel’s rescue of Waffles the hamster fresh in my memory.
He tosses the bag into the cart and gives Ben a triumphant fist bump. “How about we grab a box of popsicles to eat in the backyard when we get home? My treat.”
Ben’s pleading gaze implores me to say yes, and yet again I relent with a sigh. “That sounds great, thanks.” But I add, “And I am never taking both of you grocery shopping at the same time again. We’d leave with a cart full of snacks and not one green thing.”
As we work our way around the store, tossing products into the shopping cart, Joel chats with Ben, and I can focus on the list I made. We’re in and out of the store in under thirty minutes, a literal record.
Since Joel drove to work this morning, we load the groceries into the trunk of my car. Not that I manage to lift one bag before Joel takes over, and we drive back to the house separately.
Joel beats us to the house by seconds and climbs out of his car while I’m parking up in the driveway beside him.
He leans against my open window. “Why don’t you get Ben out of his car seat and into the house while I unload the groceries?”
“Would I be wasting my time offering to unload as well?” I ask, already suspecting I know the answer.
He straightens. “Without a doubt.”
I open the trunk for Joel, then get Ben and his bag of stickers and sticker book into the house. In the kitchen, Ben asks for a popsicle while Joel carries in four bags of groceries. After a quick search, I find the popsicles, unwrap one, and hand it to Ben.
“Eat it slowly,” I say.
“Okay, Mommy. Can I go in the backyard?”
He’s still wearing his yellow plastic firefighter helmet, and I will have to pry it off his head before his bath later, so I don’t ask him to take it off. He was proudly showing it off to Sara, the grocery store owner, so I’ll leave that battle for when he’s tired out.
There’s not much that can hurt him in the fenced-in backyard, so I nod. “And no running up and down the porch stairs.”
“Can I sit on the bottom step?”
“Yes, you can.”
Once I’ve checked that he’s settled on the back porch with his popsicle, I return to the kitchen to start filling the freezer before anything can melt. As I do so, Joel carries the groceries into the kitchen.
“That’s the last of it,” Joel says, setting one last bag down on the dining table.
“Thanks.” I point my finger at him when he moves to unpack a bag. “Don’t you dare, Joel Shaw. You brought them in; the least I can do is unpack.”
His cheeks dimple, and he lifts both hands in surrender. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I see Joel leaning against the counter beside the refrigerator, his arms crossed and his bulging biceps causing me a world of distraction as I put away the freezer foods.
“How do you do it?” he asks.
I shove a bag of peas into the freezer and shut the door. “Do what?”
“Stay so positive with Ben. No matter how exhausted you look, you’re still so damn patient and sweet with him.”
Blushing at his compliment, I move on to another bag. “I promise you I don’t know what I’m doing nine times out of ten. I have pretty great parents who taught me a lot, and teaching ten-year-olds will challenge anyone to be more patient.”
Over breakfast and dinner, we’ve shared more about ourselves, including my past as a teacher. I left teaching after Simon got a big promotion, and I stayed home with Ben.
“Will you ever go back to teaching?” he asks.
I shrug. I planned to go back to work when Ben needed me less, but that never happened. “Maybe one day. I don’t know yet. I do miss it.”
Outside, I hear Ben talking. Those little conversations he has with himself reassure me that he is where he said he would be, and isn’t getting into mischief while I don’t have an eye on him.
Joel wanders over to the window and peers out. “He’s talking to himself.”
I smile. “He started doing it when he was three, just talking about the toys he was going to play with next. He doesn’t do it as much anymore. Does Harry?”
Joel flashes me a grin. “Not as much as he used to, at least not when I go to visit. I think I’m too distracting.”
I laugh. “Probably. What was your mom like?” I ask, curious about the woman who raised two men with a need to help others so ingrained into them that both became firefighters.
He snorts. “Under siege from morning to night. Noah and I fought constantly.”
I can’t help but laugh. “When did you stop?”
I was an only child. While I’d have loved to have a brother or sister to play with, I figured life would be fun with a sibling, not filled with endless fights.
“Never. They went on a month-long cruise after we’d both moved out," he says with a smile. "I think they’d been dreaming about it for years.”
I clap my hand over my mouth to contain my laughter.
He flashes me a quick grin before looking out the window again.
It’s quiet. Ben is no longer talking to himself. But I know Ben. He’ll be in here wanting to play with Joel the second he’s finished his popsicle or the dreaded boredom sets in.
“What’s he doing?” I ask.
“Cartwheels.” He turns back to face me, proud. “He’s a lot better.”
“His popsicle?” He couldn’t have finished it that fast.
“A melting green pool on the porch step.”
I shake my head, unsurprised at the fate of his popsicle.
“Of course it is. I’ll clean up the mess once I’ve finished in here.
” Reaching for another bag on the dining table, I continue putting groceries away.
“I’ve been thinking about signing him up for gymnastics.
It’s not like him to be this determined. ”
I struggle to believe how much I’m loving the ordinariness of this moment. Talking with Joel. Ben doing cartwheels on the soft grass outside on a bright, sunny day. Unpacking groceries as I learn more about Joel. It all feels like yet another piece of the puzzle clicking into place.
“And will those lessons be in Rios or Memphis?” Joel asks, his tone switching from relaxed to far too casual.
There’s no missing the tension in his shoulders as I slide a box of cereal into a cupboard near the sink. He’s resting one hip against the counter, arms crossed, but there’s no way this man is as calm as he’s pretending to be.
“Your life is in Rios.” My heart thinks it might be here too; my guilt whispers that it’s too soon to move on from Simon. And my body? Hasn’t stopped responding to the three men in this house like a bale of straw going up in flames.
“It doesn’t have to be forever. People make a home. When those people are gone, it doesn’t feel the same.”
I know all about how losing someone can change the feel of a familiar place once filled with so many happy memories. Home stopped feeling like home after Simon was gone. Selling up was one of the easiest decisions I ever made.
I stop putting away groceries and turn to face Joel. He watches me, expression unreadable. “Are you telling me you’d follow Ben and me to Memphis?”
He uncrosses his arms and walks slowly toward me, giving me all the time in the world to run or tell him to stop.
I do neither. I watch and wait, my breath catching in my throat as he closes the distance between us.
His hands rest on the counter on either side of me, caging me in.
His body is inches away, our hips almost, but not quite, touching.
“If I had to.” His heated gaze flicks to my mouth. “Do I have to?”
I look away, focusing on the paper grocery bags I left on the floor, before he kisses me. More importantly, before he sees how much I want him to.
“Is Rios that bad?” he asks when I don’t reply.
I shake my head and curl my fingers, resisting the urge to touch. Joel is so very tempting. “It’s not that. My parents will expect Ben and me to go home after this road trip.”
We abandoned it before we even started, and I’m not sure when we’ll pick it up again.
Summer won’t last forever. Ben will start school in the fall, and a road trip like this can’t happen again until next summer at the earliest. With a newborn needing all my attention, the odds of me getting in a car for a three-week road trip across the country are slim to none.
“And what do you and Ben want?” Joel asks, voice low. “Because I’d say your parents would want whatever makes the two of you happiest.”
He’s right.
“I think it’s pretty clear what Ben wants,” I say, still not looking at him.
“And what do you want?”
“I don’t know,” I lie. When he doesn’t respond, I peek up at him. “What?”
“I told you I wouldn’t be pinning you against walls and kissing you.”
I gulp at the heat in his eyes. “You did say that.”
“But if feelings are involved…” he trails off.
“Then?” My heart skips a beat, and my eyes betray me by darting to his mouth.
“That changes things.”
And I realize he led me right into a trap of my own making.
My lips curve into a reluctant smile. “You know I want you to kiss me, don’t you?”
His smile is blink-and-miss. “I usually have some idea when a woman is thinking of kissing me. You keep looking at my mouth for one.”
My gaze drifts to it again, fuller at the bottom than at the top, as if drawn by an invisible string. “I wanted to at the firehouse.”