11. Nico
CHAPTER 11
NICO
T he next morning, Louis woke bright and early and ready for a day of school. He told Nico, in excited bursts between bites of cereal, that he needed to write a story for his French class and that he was going to write about Lauren.
“You only just met her,” Nico pointed out. “What exactly are you going to write?”
Louis rolled his eyes, looking for a moment very much like the teenager he would eventually become.
“It doesn’t have to be a real story, Papa. I’m going to write about how you and Lauren and I travel back in time to save a special dinosaur egg.”
“That sounds like a very exciting story,” Nico said. He took a sip of his coffee. He would need it for the day ahead.
“Yeah.” Louis looked proud of himself. “I think it will be. When’s Lauren coming over next?”
“I’m not sure, kiddo. Probably not for a little while.” Louis looked disappointed, and Nico tried to pretend that he didn’t feel the same way. He would have loved to have Lauren over again as soon as possible, even tonight, but he felt that he needed to give her space and time. Plus, they’d agreed only yesterday to take things slow, and a second date in two days wasn’t exactly slow.
“Man.” Louis shook his head sadly.
“I know, bud.” Nico ruffled his son’s hair. “Now go get dressed, or we’re going to be late for school.”
As Louis ran upstairs to switch out his pajamas for his school uniform, Nico took another sip of his coffee. If he were being honest with himself, the fact that his son was just as enamored with Lauren as he was felt like a good sign.
Although it was also a sign that Nico needed to be careful. If both he and his son were head over heels for Lauren already, and she changed her mind about wanting to be in a relationship, it would hurt both of them. This was one of the main reasons Nico had steered clear of relationships for the past few years — along with the fact that he had no time.
Nico’s phone beeped with a message, and he set down his coffee to check it. The message was from Lauren.
I had a nice time last night.
Nico smiled and wrote back.
Me too. Would you like to meet up after classes? Louis will be at soccer practice and I know a good hot chocolate place a few blocks from campus.
Apparently, all it took was one message from Lauren for him to drop all his concerns about taking things too quickly. At least they’d be meeting without Louis, which was probably best for now. Nico waited, phone in hand, for Lauren’s reply.
Sure! My last class ends at four.
Nico grinned as he tapped out a reply. He felt like a teenager glued to his phone, checking for new messages. He and Lauren texted back a few more times, agreeing on a time and place to meet and swapping a few jokes. With great effort, Nico managed to put his phone away when Louis came back downstairs, dressed and with his backpack on. They walked together to Louis’s school while the young boy shared more of his story ideas. At drop-off, they hugged goodbye and Nico checked his phone again as Louis ran inside. There was another message from Lauren asking about a French word she’d heard that morning. Grinning, Nico texted back.
The rest of the day was spent alternately teaching and checking his phone between classes for more messages from Lauren. Nico knew that he was already breaking his plans of taking things slow, but the feeling of texting with Lauren was too wonderful to stop.
After his last class, Nico had another half an hour before Lauren would be ready for their date, so he returned to his office to grade a few papers. This wasn’t his favorite part of his job, and he found it even more difficult to concentrate today than usual. Finally, his watch showed that it was time to meet Lauren, and Nico made his way to the quad where they’d agreed to meet.
Lauren looked as lovely as ever today. She was wearing a pair of black slacks and a blue button-up blouse, and her hair was pulled back with a clip.
“Hey.” She smiled at Nico and he smiled back.
“Nice to see you again.” He took her elbows and kissed each of her cheeks, as was the French way. She blushed, as was her way. “Shall we?”
At Lauren’s nod, Nico led her toward the café he had in mind.
“This place has the best hot chocolate,” he told her as they walked. “It’s so rich, it’s almost like drinking melted chocolate.”
“I can’t wait.” Lauren grinned. “I love hot chocolate, but I usually end up drinking Swiss Miss.”
“What’s that?”
“Instant hot chocolate powder.”
Nico’s eyes widened in horror. “I don’t think you can even say you like hot chocolate, because that isn’t hot chocolate. Just wait until you try this .”
“We’ll see. Maybe the powder is better.” Lauren winked.
“That’s just such a terrible thing to say.” Nico shook his head. “I don’t know if I still want to take you to the café if you aren’t going to enjoy it.”
“I’m sure I will. Does Louis like this place?”
“Of course. We can never tell him that we got hot chocolate without him.”
“My lips are sealed.” Lauren mimed closing her mouth with a zipper and throwing away the key. “You said he’s at soccer practice today, right?”
“Right. He has practice every Tuesday and Thursday. Some weeks he loves it, and other weeks he says it’s terrible, but he always wants to go back.”
Lauren chuckled. “I think a lot of kids feel that way about their after-school activities. I was in gymnastics all through elementary school, and I went back and forth between loving it and hating it.”
“Gymnastics? Intriguing. Were you any good?”
Lauren wobbled a hand from side to side and Nico laughed.
“I can still do a cartwheel and touch my toes, but that’s about it.”
“Maybe you can teach Louis. He really wants to learn how to do a cartwheel, but so far it’s been a series of disasters.”
“I’d love to.”
Oh, no. This was moving too fast again. Nico raised a hand and they both stopped walking.
“But only if you want to. Just because we’re dating doesn’t mean you need to be a big part of Louis’s life.”
“I understand that it might be concerning for me to be involved with Louis when we don’t know how things will go between us, so I’m happy to take things as slow as you want to with him and with us. But I also want you to know that I think Louis is a wonderful boy and I’d be happy to spend more time with him, when and if you’re comfortable with that.”
“Wow.” Nico reached for Lauren’s hand and squeezed it, then kept walking with their hands entwined. “How did I get so lucky as to meet you?”
“I don’t know, but I am pretty special.” Lauren winked. “And so are you. And so is Louis. I really do think we can make all this work.”
“I really hope so.” They smiled at each other, then Nico ran his thumb over the back of Lauren’s hand. Her smile softened, and Nico felt his heart warm.
“Anyway, back to the original topic. Is Louis good at soccer?”
“He’s not bad.” Nico gave a proud grin. “He’s a good defender for his age. Or at least I would say so.”
“And are you any good at soccer?”
“Like a lot of people, I played some while I was growing up. I don’t know if I’d go so far as to say that I was good at it, though. In the league where I played I wasn’t bad, but we were definitely a casual Saturday league, nothing serious.”
“Reading between the lines, I bet you were a pretty great soccer player.”
“I was decent,” Nico repeated. “But I wasn’t that excited about it. I was the kind of kid and teenager who preferred to be inside with a book than outdoors playing in the grass. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve developed much more of an enjoyment for the outdoors, but when I was younger, it wasn’t really there. Now, Louis is the opposite. He loves his dinosaurs and reading, but if he has an option, he almost always chooses to go outside and run around than stay inside. It’s been good for me, I think, because it’s gotten me out more.”
“I was quite an outdoorsy child myself,” Lauren said. “My grandfather lived near the edge of town and we spent a lot of weekends exploring the forest nearby or walking around the farms. Even now I don’t know how children can grow up in a city without having plenty of space to run and play.”
“I never knew anything but the city. I think even Louis thinks that the wilderness is the big city park near our house.”
Lauren smiled. “Paris does have some big parks, so I could see how he’d mistake them for the wilderness.”
“Maybe I should take him out of the city more often, though.” Nico tilted his head. Parenting was an issue he felt very strongly about. Since he was Louis’s one and only parent now, he had to be right and he had to do his best. Whenever someone criticized his choices, or even made a casual comment against them like Lauren had done, he felt defensive. But for some reason, Lauren’s comment about children growing up in cities made him think instead of putting him on edge.
“I’ve heard wonderful things about the French countryside. Aren’t there lots of rolling hills and butterflies?”
Nico chuckled. “Sometimes. But I suppose it’s like the countryside most places. There are some idyllic picnic spots and some fields that smell like cows.”
“I suppose.”
“And on that note, we’re here.” Nico opened the door of the café, releasing Lauren’s hand with some regret as he did so. She entered the café and took a deep breath of the chocolatey air. Nico smiled at her obvious enjoyment.
“This smells great.”
“I know. I love it. Here, I like this table by the window.”
They took seats across from each other at the small round table, and a waiter promptly came over to check on them.
“Two classic hot chocolates, please,” Nico said. “If you’re okay with that,” he added in English for Lauren’s benefit.
“ Oui ,” she said with a grin. The waiter nodded, made a note, and headed toward the kitchen. “I know it’s too early to say, but I think my French is already getting better.”
“You’re probably right,” Nico said. “Sometimes just living in a place where the language is spoken all the time is all you need to improve quickly.”
“Yeah, and it probably doesn’t hurt that I’m actually trying again after years of not speaking any French.”
“True. If you want to speak French with me sometimes, we can. I am your professor, after all.” Nico winked.
“Oh, I almost forgot. Now I’m one of those girls who dates her professor. And for all you know, it’s so that I can get a better grade in your class.” Lauren wiggled her eyebrows.
“I knew it all along.” Nico shook his head. “That’s why you turned up in my neighborhood in distress two weeks ago. You knew even before you got the job at the college that your grade in a casual community French class would be essential to your future happiness.”
“I did.” Lauren nodded firmly. “It’s been hard, but you have to do what you have to do.”
“ Et maintenant, nous allons parler en fran?ais ,” Nico continued. Lauren blinked at him, so he repeated the phrase more slowly. Her confused look cleared and she grinned.
“ Oui. Mais je ne parle pas bien .”
“I would have to disagree. That was great!”
“But you switched back to English.” Lauren raised her eyebrows. “That means you must not trust my French skills.”
“Now I’m offended.” Nico clasped his hand to his chest. “Your French is wonderful. Encore, en fran?ais .”
They spent the next half an hour or so speaking French. Lauren’s French was still limited and a little clumsy, but she was able to hold up her side of a conversation about the colors of nearby objects, then about their hobbies, then about numbers. Finally, Lauren dropped her head onto the table.
“Please, let’s go back to English for a bit. My brain feels like it’s going to explode.”
Nico chuckled. “I felt the same way when I first learned English as a child. That’s why it was so important to me to raise Louis to be bilingual.”
“Did you just speak English to him half the time until he learned it?”
“When he was a baby, I only spoke English to him, and Léa spoke French. Now we mostly speak in English, since the rest of his life is in French. As he gets older, I sometimes think he prefers English, since so many shows and books are in English. I might need to make more of an effort to introduce him to the wonders of French.”
“ The wonders of French .” Lauren chuckled. “You really sound like a professor now.”
“Well, that makes sense, since I am one. Maybe you need to step up your professorial speech a little.”
“Does that mean I should be raving about the wonders of French, too?”
“No, no. Of course not. You should be raving about the wonders of English, specifically grammar and vocabulary and other topics that students don’t tend to enjoy.”
Lauren nodded slowly. “That makes sense. I can get one of those T-shirts that says I love participles. ”
Nico nodded back. “You’ll be very popular.”
They lingered until long after they’d finished their hot chocolates, trading stories from Nico’s several years as a professor and Lauren’s first two days as one. It was nice to hear from someone who was so new to teaching, because she had a very different perspective. In some ways, it was like walking along the Seine with her had been. Lauren’s enthusiasm and excitement made Nico enjoy things he’d started to take for granted, like the pride of a student giving a particularly good answer or the thrill of getting a laugh out of one of the less-engaged students, in a new way. Lauren, for her part, thanked Nico for the tips he smattered in alongside his stories of epic professorial fails from his first year.
Finally, Nico glanced at his watch and realized that time had gone by more quickly than he’d thought.
“I need to run and pick up Louis,” he told her.
“Sure. Thanks for the hot chocolate.” She toasted him with her empty mug. “It really was delicious.”
“I’m glad.” Nico got to his feet and gathered his briefcase. He’d already paid, so he just smiled at Lauren and headed for the door. Part of him wanted to go back and invite her to come with him, to watch the last few minutes of soccer practice, and then perhaps to come home with them for dinner. But he forced himself to keep walking, alone. He didn’t want to rush their relationship, not when there were so many factors to consider.
Still, when he got a text from Lauren later that evening asking if he and Louis might be interested in getting ice cream together over the weekend, he couldn’t reply yes quickly enough.