6. A Proper Meeting #2
Sam reached up, sliding his fingers around his son’s ribcage. The rough of his palms grazed over the backs of my knuckles, and the tiniest skittering sparks skipped over my skin. These ones weren’t angry.
Sam’s eyes zipped to mine, and for a moment, we held our son together, looking at each other.
“Got him?” I whispered.
Sam nodded.
I pulled my hands away and stepped back.
Sam gazed at his son, his expression still and deer-like, as if he was worried any small movement might startle Henry.
Then Tommy said, “You can like, hold him against your chest.”
“Right.” Sam brought Henry to him, sliding an arm under his son’s bottom and bracing his back with his other hand. He looked back at Tommy. “Is this good?”
“Yeah,” Tommy said. “That’s good.”
Sam’s eyes went to me, and his lips ticked up on one side.
For a moment, none of us spoke. It occurred to me that anyone passing by might mistake us for a family. Which was hilarious, truly, when you considered how we were all connected. Strangers and mistakes and feelings and blood.
I looked back at the group off to the side, my mostly still-new friends, who’d welcomed me into their lives with open arms only a couple of weeks ago. Most of them were pretending not to look. Kit stared, her eyes watery. Winona, too. If Sarah were here, she’d probably sob openly.
I felt my throat grow thick with gratitude. No matter how weird this was; how much I’d dreaded this moment, they’d been in my corner.
When I looked back at Sam, he’d pulled his face back and was once again staring at his son.
“I’m gonna see if that donut guy is here,” Tommy said. Then he abruptly strode off.
“Keep your phone on!” I called after him.
Tommy lifted a hand but didn’t turn back. His other hand was in a fist at his side.
Sam looked from me to Tommy. “Is everything okay?”
“Yeah.” It wasn’t. But I had to pick my battles.
When I looked back at Sam, I realized he was trying not to cry. I felt like I’d knocked into an old wound. A painful one I didn’t want pressed again.
“What are you doing for work right now, Sam?” I asked.
I needed to get back into neutral territory.
Plus, I was genuinely curious. He’d been at the conference to try to break into the homebuilding business.
He’d idolized Jamie Reilly, Sarah’s fiancé and at the time, owner of Reilly Contracting, a well-respected contracting firm in town Jamie’s son now ran.
“Are you with one of Jamie’s rival companies? ”
Sam, gripping Henry’s back like he thought his son might make a run for it, didn’t meet my eye. “I’m kind of in a holding pattern.”
“Is that code for unemployed?”
He smiled briefly. “Sounds like it, I know. But no, I have a job. I’m just figuring things out. Still.”
He sounded a little frustrated, maybe with himself.
I had so many questions, but I didn’t really want to delve deep with him. I’d made the decision that we would simply figure out how to be cordial; how to involve Sam in Henry’s life with as little involvement in mine as possible.
“How about you? Are you teaching here?”
“I will be. Once Heartbreaker’s trade school launches this fall. I’m on the board, too.”
“That’s really cool, Ellie. You made it happen.” He gave me a smile which looked like he really thought it was.
I remember gushing to him about Sarah’s talk about the Heartbreaker Trades collective at the conference. How she’d invited me to join them as more than just a member. I couldn’t figure out how from California. What else did he remember?
“Winona made it happen,” I said, throwing a thumb back to my new friend, several paces behind us. Heartbreaker was Winona’s baby. She dreamed of a world where women could feel welcome and safe in the trades and had actually done something about it.
“I’m sure she wouldn’t have just anyone representing her.”
Heat prickled my cheeks. He wasn’t allowing me to be modest. “Anyway. Right now I’m still doing client work, so I won’t be living the dream for a bit yet.”
I don’t know why I said it like that. I loved my trade. Or, I used to.
Henry chose that moment to squawk, thankfully distracting me from that worrying line of thought. He seemed to have noticed I was next to him but deigned not to be holding him. He reached his chubby arms out, taking a dive in my direction.
“Whoa!” Sam looked panicked.
I pulled Henry into my arms. “Babies have little respect for gravity.”
I could see Sam’s pulse fluttering in his throat. “Guess I need more practice.”
He shoved his hands in his pockets, looking at Henry like he’d let him down.
“It’s okay,” I said. “You’ll pick it up soon enough.”
I only realized the implication of the words after they were out there. I was offering him more time with Henry. Which meant more time with me. Sam seemed to too, his eyes meeting mine with a kind of hopefulness that squeezed my heart like a fist.
I don’t know what my hesitation was. It was an inevitable next step.
And it was simply about Sam getting to know his son.
Not about any kind of future arrangement.
Certainly not about anything between us, Henry’s parents.
That was a one-time thing a long time ago, that the universe had made very clear was a big mistake.
But what a perfect, blue-eyed mistake he was.
I inhaled Henry’s scent. It must have intoxicated me; thrown me back into baby-brain. Because when I opened my mouth again, I found myself looking directly at Sam. “You can come over this week if you want. I could use some help with Henry while I try to get dinner on the table.”
That hopefulness in Sam’s eyes turned to something like disbelief. Then gratitude. Like a puppy being told it was walk time. Which made me feel like shit, because he should have access to his kid. Within reason.
“Are you sure?”
“Of course,” I said. “I mean, I don’t know what your schedule is like—”
“I can make it work. I’ll be there Monday. If that’s okay.”
Monday as in the day after tomorrow. A tightness suddenly cinched my chest.
“Four okay?” Half of me hoped the early time wouldn’t be possible for him to do with his job. The other half looked deeply forward to the possibility of planning a meal—or the week’s meals—without Henry crawling around my legs or demanding to be held in close proximity to a spattering stove.
“Four’s great.”
I let out a breath. Then Archie asked Sam to play catch with him since his dad was busy talking to Kit and Chip. I joined the others, while Sam and Archie drifted into the field next to the market. The ball arced higher and higher as they backed away from each other for bigger throws.
Sam threw with the kind of practiced ease and power that told me he must have played ball at some point, too.
He looked over at me, catching me staring.
Luckily all of us were watching as we talked to each other.
Then he caught Archie’s wild throw and laughed.
He looked so much more at ease than he had a moment ago.
More like that version of him I met that night.
A fluttering of nerves took off in my stomach before I looked away. Which made no sense.
None at all.