Chapter 22
Why isn't it matching up?
Stepping back, I tilt my head and squint at the wall, hoping a different angle will make the uneven wallpaper seam look better.
Nope.
It's just four millimeters off, but I can't unsee it. Stepping forward again, I press my palm flat against the edge of the panel, looking for the section that overlaps.
“I honestly can't see anything, Honey,” Olivia says from behind. “And I don't think our baby boy is going to measure out the stripes to check either. He's just going to be happy that his aunt loved him enough to spend an entire afternoon doing this for him.”
My hand continues to stroke the wall. “Better doing this than thinking about tomorrow.”
Am I excited about leaving here and starting a new life at the college that I chose? Yes, but that doesn’t make me any less nervous about the prospect.
“It’s off,” I say louder when I finally find the overlapping section.
“It’s not off. It’s fine.”
I shake my head, turning back to the wallpaper draped over the queen-sized bed to see if we have enough left to change out the panel completely. “I can't leave it. It's going to drive me insane every time I look at it.”
Olivia laughs as she places her hands on my shoulders and turns me around.
“Stop. Look at it. It's beautiful.” She drops her head on my shoulder, and I swear I can hear her hum in contentment.
Ever since Olivia hit her third trimester, she's been the calmest I've ever seen her. It's almost unsettling.
“I can’t. That stripe is off.”
“Well, that stripe is going behind the crib, so no one is going to see it.”
“But you know what I’m talking about. So you can see it.”
When she doesn’t answer, I turn and grab another roll.
“If I don't fix it now, when Baby Wilson becomes a teenager, he's going to see those stripes and roll his eyes.”
My Aunt Honey can't do anything right. All she had to do was follow a line and she couldn't even do that.
I shake my head, pushing away the negative self-talk.
With another roll half unwrapped, I turn, nearly bumping into Olivia. She doesn't flinch. she just licks her lips, trying to hide her smirk. “Wow, you really think our son is going to have an attitude with you when he's thirteen?”
I shrug. “He's your child. I'm sure he'll have no problem telling me how it is.”
She snorts, pulling me in for a hug and stopping me on my wallpaper warpath. “Thank you for doing this, Honey. It's perfect, and I don't want you to do anything else to fix it.”
Perfect?
“It's uneven,” I point out.
“That’s part of the charm. Not everything in life has to be perfect, you know?”
She nudges me on the side.
Maybe.
“You’ve done an amazing job. If I left Mike to do it, our son would be off to college before it was on the wall.”
“I heard that,” Mike says from his office down the hall.
Olivia and I exchange looks.
“But you're not denying it,” she says.
Silence.
Our grins grow.
“Right, my feet are done for the day, and so are yours. Take a seat,” she says, motioning to the end of the bed as she waddles over to the rocking chair her parents bought them. I'm seated on the mattress before she's managed to slowly ease herself into the chair.
When she finally sits down, she rolls her shoulders and leans back. “That’s so much better,” she says with a contented sigh.
I swallow, a soft sense of pride filling my chest. I’ve known her since preschool. She’s always been confident and quietly determined about what she wants, and now she’s about to step into one of the biggest changes of her life.
“You're going to be a great mom.” The words slip out, surprising me. I've always felt it, and I'm pretty sure I've said it before, but there's something about seeing her rock back and forth, stroking her belly, that makes me even more confident in the assumption.
“I hope so,” she says before looking toward the door. “Though if he inherits Mike’s sense of direction, we’re all screwed.”
I laugh, but as the noise fades, my chest tightens. Here she is, completely calm while she develops an entire human in her body, meanwhile I'm nervous about a plane ride and a dorm room.
“Are you scared?” I ask.
“Of what? The birth?” She blows out a breath.
“I mean, it's scary thinking about things that could go wrong, but I'm hoping I'm low risk enough that it will be okay.
Besides, knowing I'm going to meet my baby boy at the end makes it all worth it.” Her eyes are bright, and she's holding back tears.
“Ugh. I'm sorry. I don't mean to get emotional. These pregnancy hormones have me going all over the place.”
“It's okay,” I say quietly, looking down at my painter’s pants, suddenly feeling inadequate again. It happens a lot, and Dr. Reeves said it will come back in waves.
Instead of pushing the thought away, I ride it out for a second, acknowledging it.
I'm not inadequate. I'm just at a different stage of my life. I'll get to where I need to be soon.
And tomorrow is me going in the right direction.
“The wallpaper looks so good.” Olivia gestures behind me.
I turn to look at it, proud that I managed to do it, and that I could at least help them with something while I've been here.
The rest of the room is still half-assembled with boxes stacked in the corner and flat-pack furniture waiting to be built, but the wall is done, and Olivia is right. It's perfect. Seam and all.
“You're right. It looks great,” I finally admit before pulling out my phone and taking a picture of the wall.
“Please don't tell me you're getting a close-up of the bad seam?” Olivia asks.
“No. I'm taking a picture of the finished wall.”
“And who are you sending it to?” she asks teasingly.
I roll my eyes even though she can't see me. “You know exactly who I'm texting.”
Zach.
He messaged me this morning, jokingly asking if it would be appropriate for a QB rookie to request a transfer two weeks into training.
I laughed it off, but I can tell this is the first time he's actually struggling with the game he loves so much.
For the first time in his career, a coach hates him.
I honestly never thought I'd see the day. Zach is just good at everything.
After taking the photo, I attach it and write out the message:
Honey: For the record, Olivia needed even more help to match the lines than you did.
“I'm going to get us a couple of drinks,” Olivia says, placing both of her hands on the sides of the rocking chair.
“Don't get up, I can—”
She raises one of her hands. “Please. Let me do it. I need to move my legs. Let me get the soda while you relax and text your situationship.”
“He's not my situationship,” I say even though she's already halfway out of the room.
She flicks her hand over her shoulder. “Yeah. Yeah.”
When she's out of the room, I look down at my phone and frown. Zach's already responded. Shouldn't he be with his teammates right now instead of messaging me?
I click open the message.
Zach: I'm choosing to believe that's a lie told by someone who can't admit I was an excellent wallpapering partner.
Honey: You hung the first panel upside down.
Zach: Intentionally. It was all a ploy to get you to come and visit me.
A sad smile pulls at my lips as the memory comes back.
I hadn’t gone over there to help him that day sophomore year. I’d gone to apologize because I’d shown up at his door the night before, drunk and crying about my own life.
I didn’t even know he was putting up wallpaper. I’d just found him on the floor in a pile of it. That was my biggest issue at St. Michael’s. I was always too anxious about my own existence to care about all the other things around me.
I couldn’t see how great Zach was because I was stuck in an eternal spiral of negativity.
Zach: Looks good, Honeycomb. I'm expecting that kind of due diligence when I get my place.
Zach sends another message before I can respond. Guessing he knew exactly what I was thinking about.
Honey: You still haven't found anywhere to live?
Zach: Nope. Haven't been looking too hard if I'm honest. Been keeping busy with this team. There's a lot of work to do.
Honey: Or you're really enjoying living with Dax. Admit it. Those eyes and his quippy one-liners would draw anyone in.
Zach: Anyone? Like you?
Honey: You don't need to worry about Dax. You know that.
The typing bubble appears almost immediately, disappears, then pops back up again.
I can practically picture him pacing somewhere, phone in hand, his thumb hovering over the screen.
I know this pattern well enough to recognize what it means—he’s deciding how honest to be with me.
Sometimes I get full-on declarations with an apology a few hours later. Other times, just a joke.
Zach: Doesn't mean I don't.
Zach: Especially when you have dudes offering you the opportunity to join a cult and cliff dive for the rest of your life while you live in a yurt.
Cult? Cliff dive?
My brow furrows until I realize he's talking about Jake. The guy I haven't even spoken to or thought about since I got off the cruise.
Honey: First of all, I would never live in a yurt.
Zach: Good. That's a relief.
Honey: Second, if I do join a cliff-diving cult, you'll be the first to know.
Zach: Appreciate that. I'd like time to emotionally prepare.
Honey: For what?
Zach: For the part where I have to fly out and steal you back.
My stupid heart skips a little as I read the message.
Honey: You're ridiculous.
Zach: And yet you keep texting me.
I stare at the screen for a second, smiling despite myself.
Then another message pops up.
Zach: Also, that seam in the middle is crooked.
I laugh just as Olivia comes back into the room and tosses me a soda as I place my phone on the bed beside me.
“Thanks,” I say.
She gets comfortable back in her rocking chair. “So, how's all of that going?” She gestures vaguely with one hand at me and the phone.
It's the first time she's openly asked me that since I got back from the cruise, and I've quite liked not having to answer any questions. It’s really given me time to figure out my relationship with Zach.
“It's going well, actually,” I say.
Olivia tilts her head. “Really?”
“Yeah. It's good. Zach's not pressuring me into anything. We just message each other about our days. It's nice to be able to talk to him like a friend, you know?”
She nods, letting out a small hum.
“He's really busy with his team, and I'm ready to head to college and start a new challenge.” It sounds rehearsed, but it's the truth. As much as I admire Olivia's contentment, I might have a little of it too.
She looks at me for a long moment, and I can see the follow-up questions queuing behind her eyes. Then she lets them go.
“Good,” she says simply. “I'm happy for you.”
“Thanks,” I say, unscrewing the soda and taking a sip.
“Ladies.”
Mike walks into the room, and the second he sees Olivia, his whole face softens. Not that he tries to hide it. He never has.
No. Mike Wilson has looked at Olivia like she’s his sunshine since they were in first grade.
I remember sitting at the back of a school bus while Olivia talked about him for forty-five solid minutes, then finished with ‘anyway, it’s not like that.’
I also lived through the painfully awkward month where she realized it was exactly like that.
I was on the phone at midnight the night he told her he loved her for the first time and was there when Mike proposed.
Never did I expect anything other than this perfect, beautiful life for them.
He makes his way to the rocking chair and kisses her on the top of her head before crouching down and dropping his hand to her stomach. Olivia immediately relaxes as she leans her head against his arm.
My heart does a little skip because all I see are two people finding their center of gravity.
“How's Zach?” Mike asks.
I look directly at him. “How did you—”
“Your face.” He says it with a grin. “You've got that dazed look in your eyes you get when you're thinking, talking, or looking at him. First time I noticed it was at senior prom.”
My cheeks heat, and I take a long swig of my drink to avoid saying anything.
He shrugs. “It's not a bad thing. Zach's face does the same thing whenever you're mentioned.”
It does?
I glance at Olivia. “He’s not lying.”
“We were just texting,” I say.
“Sure, texting when he's supposed to be playing his first NFL game in about—” he checks his watch, “three hours.”
“He's been at the stadium all day. He won't be late.”
“All day? Is that how long you've been texting?” he teases even though he knows the answer. “Anyway, since it's your last night with us, I thought we could get a pizza and watch his game.”
“Aww, that sounds good,” Olivia says. “Honey, what do you think?”
“Sure.”
“Great. You and I will share a pizza since Olivia is gonna want everything on hers.”
“Hey! It's not my fault our baby likes the taste of pickles on top.”
“Case in point,” he says as he helps pull Olivia out of the rocking chair. His hand wraps around her waist and rests at her side. “You coming down?”
“Yeah, just a sec.”
I grab my phone from the bed and quickly type out a message before following them out of the room.
Honey: Good luck, Z. I’m so proud of you. You’ve worked so hard for this, and now it’s finally yours. You’ve grown into the man you were always meant to be... and I feel lucky I get to watch it happen.
I glance back at the seam one more time. It's still uneven. I leave it.