Chapter 27 Miles
MILES
I fucking hate the end of summer even more than I hate the beginning of summer because it usually means an Indian summer is coming next and then the leaves on the trees in LA just die instead of gradually changing colors and there’s the Santa Ana winds, which I hate more than anything.
I stare up at the ceiling for about half an hour before checking my personal phone, saying a little prayer that I’ll find a text from Aria this morning.
Not a prayer, so much as a haiku.
What the fuck now, Universe?
What do I have to do—beg?
Make her text me. Fuck.
Instead, there’s a voicemail from Owen’s fiancée, Frankie.
“Hello and good morning! This is the beloved celebrity and national treasure whose name rhymes with Schmew Schmarrymore! It’s an amazing, wonderful day to be alive, unless your name rhymes with Schmiles Schmodie!
Because there is a beautiful, amazing ocean flower goddess out there—who can sing and dance and write and direct—and she should be my new BFF by now, but she isn’t because you blew it, Miles!
You blew it. Sigh. The universe is kind and the universe will forgive you for being only human.
But I won’t. Sending you powerful beams of love and light that will hopefully hit you in the head and smack some sense into you!
… But seriously, you need to call Owen back because he’s worried about you. Bye.”
I guess that was the Drew Barrymore voicemail Owen warned me about. I don’t think anything would have prepared me for it. Especially not after a week of being deprived of the sunshine of Aria’s love.
I see no point in getting out of bed today, except that I have to make sure Macy eats breakfast and we have to be at the theatre by seven. Four more performances, and then this Alice in Wonderland run is over. Macy will be starting school again.
I don’t understand anything anymore. I don’t know how I could have made such a mess of things.
I had it all figured out after my marriage fell apart.
All I had to do was focus on work and my daughter.
The rest of my family would never believe it, but I started prioritizing them more too.
Everything made sense before I started having feelings for another human being who wasn’t a Brodie.
I have so many questions. Why is Aria keeping those damn curtains closed in her bedroom all the time now?
Will I ever see her beautiful naked body again?
Will I ever be allowed to kiss her lips and touch her hair and squeeze that ass and just…
hear her voice and make her smile and be around her?
And why can’t she work with an ugly, old lady composer?
What does she want, and why can’t it just be me? The man who will never deserve her. The man who is always right about everything except how to behave in some magical way that will keep the woman he loves happy and in love with him forever.
“Daddy!” Macy slaps both hands against my bedroom door. “Daddy!” She sounds so frantic.
“What?! You can come in. What?”
She opens the door and looks so relieved to see me. “You didn’t do the dishes last night!”
“Oh. Yeah. I’ll do them later.”
She approaches my bed hesitantly. “Are you sick?”
“No. I just didn’t feel like doing them last night. I’ll get up soon. What do you want for breakfast?”
“If you don’t feel good, I can make breakfast.”
“No, I’m getting up.” I keep lying there, staring at the ceiling. “I’m getting up.”
When I finally make it down to the kitchen, I seem to have lost my personal phone, but I find half of the contents of my refrigerator spread out on the island countertop and Macy standing on the step stool, reaching for some plates in the cupboard.
“I’ll get it! Let me get those, honey.”
“I’m making dairy-free pancakes.”
“Okay, but I’ll get the plates.”
“Okay, but I can’t find the pancake mix.”
“Well…I don’t know if I have any. I see you’ve taken out all of the cartons of almond milk and eggs, though. How about cereal and scrambled eggs?”
She wipes strands of hair from her face. “Actually, Uncle Owen is going to come by to pick us up soon.”
“What? Why?” I find my phone on the countertop. “Did you bring my phone down here?”
“You need to put on different pants,” she tells me, looking down at my sweats. “And a clean shirt. And brush your teeth and comb your hair.”
“Why is Owen coming by?”
“I called him because I know you’re sad that you and Aria aren’t being friends who kiss anymore. You need our help, and we have ideas. Uncle Dylan is going to meet us there.”
“I’m not sad.” Okay, maybe I’m sad. “Meet us where?”
“Come on, come on! You have to get ready! I’ll help dress you!”
Twenty-five minutes later, I’m inside the neon pink bakery with Macy, Owen, Dylan, Noah, and Sam.
I’m wearing the Darth Vader Father of the Year trucker hat that my daughter gave me for Father’s Day last year—even though she doesn’t get the joke—the red track pants she insisted I buy the last time I took her shopping with me, and a tank top with a pretty yellow jacket like the one she saw Harry Styles wearing once.
This would all have been tolerable if several Santa Monica moms and kids hadn’t recognized my brothers, Macy, and me, and asked for group photos.
One of them asked me to grin like the Cheshire Cat.
I really was happy to see Macy posing for pictures with those kids who’d seen her as Alice last week.
But now I’m back to being miserable again.
I didn’t think I could feel any worse than I did when I woke up and found zero texts from Aria this morning, but as I glare at my smirking brothers and mentally inform them that I will stab them with a fork if they make fun of me right now, I definitely feel worse.
Macy is so determined to run this family meeting, she doesn’t even seem annoyed that Sam is here.
She takes a giant bite of the vegan chocolate eclair she ordered and begins lecturing me before she has finished chewing it.
“Okay, Daddy. We need to help make you and Aria happy again. I think we should get an electric keyboard and learn to play it so I can sing ‘Love on Top’ by Beyoncé and Uncle Dylan and Owen can be my backup singers. We can do it on her patio to wake her up in the morning.”
“Solid plan,” Dylan says with a straight face, because he’s an asshole.
“We can have a simple dance routine choreographed by tomorrow morning at the latest. It will only be somewhat influenced by the music video. Miles, how long do you think it will take you to learn to play that song on the keyboard? An hour?”
“I can teach him to play it on the recorder,” Noah says through a mouthful of donut.
“Perfect.” Dylan holds up his hand for a high-five from his future stepson.
“Or—since we’re pitching concepts,” Owen offers while holding up a lavender cupcake with sprinkles, “I was watching some Josh Groban videos on YouTube for reasons that definitely had nothing to do with a comedy bit I’m working on, and since we all know Miles has the voice of an angel—maybe he should sing ‘You Raise Me Up’ and we all learn to play the violin. ”
“Mmm!” Sam shoves the last bite of his cinnamon roll into his mouth and joins in. “Or you could send her a cheese basket, and the cheeses have Uncle Miles’ and Macy’s faces carved into them!”
“Love it, son. You should do that, Miles. Say it with cheeses.”
Macy shakes her head. “Well, I think it should be musical, and I should be the one who sings, though. We could get my karaoke machine from Mommy’s house and do a duet of ‘Love Is An Open Door’ from Frozen.
And Uncle Dylan and Owen can just hold big bouquets of flowers behind us, like, hiding their faces, you know?
And then when the song is over, they peek around the flowers and they’re like, ‘hi!’ I like that idea because then we can all throw flowers at her. ”
Dylan widens his eyes, nodding enthusiastically. “Everyone loves flowers.”
“We should probably bring her a dozen of these cupcakes too,” Owen says.
“And make sure to bring milk too, in case she doesn’t have any,” Noah reminds us.
“Yes! Oh wait, I should write these ideas down. Does somebody have a pen? You forgot to bring my backpack.” Macy looks at me, all accusatory. “Daddy, can you type these on your phone? Not the cheese idea, though.”
“I’m not doing any of those things. None of that is going to make Aria want to be in a relationship with me.”
“But Daddy!” Macy rolls her eyes very dramatically to underscore just how big of an idiot I am. I reach over to wipe the chocolate off the corners of her mouth. “The point is she has to know that she gets to be with all of us!”
That actually makes sense to me.
Dylan leans forward, and now he has a genuine, serious look on his face. “The thing is, Miles—of course your daughter is always going to come first, but you need to make sure Aria doesn’t always feel like a distant second.”
I glance over at Macy, and she’s nodding in agreement. “Nobody wants to feel like they aren’t special. Especially girls.”
“This is your first relationship as a divorced dad,” Owen adds, “and you need to include her in the process if you want her to feel like she can be a part of the family and not a bystander.”
“It’s like when I’m with Lucky and Summer,” Macy explains—now with even more chocolate frosting and cream around her mouth.
“They’re twins, so they always know what the other is talking about even before they say it out loud.
But when I’m around, Lucky makes sure to explain their jokes to me.
Like the one about the banana and the chimpanzee.
That’s how I know he likes me and we’re going to get married when we grow up. ”
I am so caught up in this a-ha moment, I don’t even reject that concept. “Okay. Yeah. That’s what I want. I want her to be a part of this family. I need that. And if that’s what she wants, then I can give it to her.”
“I think you’ve finally found what you’re looking for, big brother,” Dylan says, grinning. “Now all you have to do is let Aria know that you’ve climbed the highest mountains and run through the fields, only to be with her.”
Yeah, I remember that night at the bar with Dylan. I’ll never admit it, though. And this…this neon pink wake-up call is even sweeter and more memorable because my daughter brought us here.
Macy finishes her eclair and wipes her own mouth and fingers before putting her hand on my arm and saying, “Because, Daddy…I used to really, really wish for you and Mommy to sit together in an audience and watch me onstage in a musical. But now I want you and Aria to be together on closing night. So you have to make sure she comes to that, okay?”
“Okay, honey. I’ll make sure.”
She goes back to the counter with Sam and Noah to decide what they should take home to Frankie and Scarlett.
My brothers and I look at each other, silently acknowledging that we never thought we’d see the day we’d all be sitting together in a bakery with our kids.
For the first time—maybe ever—I have a feeling we’re all going to be okay.
We might all end up with that thing that Mama and Pops have.
Imperfect marriages that last because even when one of us says, or does, or texts the wrong thing, we always let each other know that we’re still here for them and that they’re still special.