Chapter 20
CHAPTER TWENTY
RORY
“Ella!” I called out the window of my car at my retreating seven-year-old. “Could you at least wait until I come to a full stop, please?”
“Sorry, Momma!” she yelled over her shoulder, but she just kept right on running around the side of her grandparents’ house and into the wooded paradise that awaited her. It didn’t matter that it was hot enough for the devil himself to sweat, that girl played outside all day if she was able.
I shook my head, put the car in park, and glanced into the back seat at Ava. “You gonna play with your sister, or would you like to help Mimi and me with supper?”
Ava shrugged but otherwise didn’t offer another answer. That was all it seemed to be with her lately. Shrugs, head shakes, a grunt if I was lucky. I hadn’t thought I’d have to worry about this sort of sullen angst for another couple of years. I absolutely wasn’t ready for this sass to be part of our daily lives, but it appeared to be here for the duration. And, truth be told, I had no idea how to handle it.
The three of us were in uncharted territory, and I—the leader, the know-it-all, the perfectionist who didn’t do something if I couldn’t do it right—was without a compass. I was floundering, plain and simple.
I’d found myself questioning every single parenting move I made since I split with Sean. I had no idea what it was like to grow up with divorced parents, so I couldn’t relate to what my girls were going through, and I hated that.
Moreover, I had no idea how to broach the subject, if I should even talk about it, and how much—or how little—I should say. So I’d just avoided it entirely. Not my best parenting move, but the one I’d needed to make just to stay sane.
“Well, I’m goin’ in, and I’d love to have your help,” I said. “I know Mimi would too.”
That earned me an eye roll I pretended not to see because if I acknowledged it, I’d have to punish Ava for the disrespect. And quite frankly, I didn’t have it in me today. I was exhausted—not just from the normal ins and outs of a full day as a single mom, but from… Well, from all the teeth-rattling, earthshaking, stars-exploding sex I’d been having with a too-hot-for-his-own-good contractor.
Nash had shown up at my house that day I’d offered myself up for his lunch pleasure. And it’d been a near-constant barrage of amazing sex ever since.
I should’ve been ashamed of myself for how I was behaving—bedding a man who was so much younger than me, all the while keeping it a secret from any and everyone. I couldn’t imagine what my sisters would say if they knew. Worse, I couldn’t imagine what the town would say—and there was no doubt in my mind they’d have a whole lot to run their mouths about.
“Momma, you comin’?” Ava called from the front porch, her hand stilled on the doorknob.
“Be right there!” Yeah, as soon as I cooled myself off thanks to the onslaught of wholly inappropriate thoughts. I blasted the air conditioning in my car, leaned back against my seat, and closed my eyes…where flashes of Nash’s naked body moving over mine came unbidden to my mind.
I snapped my eyes open, turned off the car, and hustled into my childhood home. If anything could get my mind off my hot sex partner, it’d be chopping up vegetables with my momma and daughter right next to me.
I strode through the front door without knocking, hanging my purse on the hook by the door. Cinnamon and cloves greeted me, and I inhaled the familiar pairing. Much as I loved the scent, it never failed to make my heart clench, remembering life in this house before I’d left for college. Not that my childhood had been bad—I’d never wanted for anything…except support. But it had been challenging. Struggling to live up to my daddy’s unrealistic expectations and failing every single time.
Was it any wonder the scent that accompanied my childhood anxieties made my stomach churn as an adult? No matter that I was a grown woman with two kids of my own, or that I hadn’t needed my daddy’s approval in a long time. Old habits died hard. And I feared I’d still be yearning for that approval thirty years from now.
I shook my head of the thoughts and followed the soft cadence of my mom and my daughter in conversation.
“Aren’t you a little young for a boyfriend?” my momma asked, and I froze in place, not daring to move an inch closer for fear Ava would clam up as soon as I came into view. And this I absolutely had to hear, because boyfriend ? I hadn’t known a single thing about a boyfriend.
“I’m not gonna kiss him or anything, Mimi,” Ava said.
“Well, that’s good to know, I suppose.”
“’Sides, Kelsey’s already had three boyfriends.”
My momma hummed. “I see. Well, then I suppose I’d better book you an appointment at the salon.”
I scrunched my brow, having absolutely no idea what one had to do with the other.
Fortunately, it seemed, neither did my daughter. “Why do you need to do that?”
“Well, if you’re determined to do everything Kelsey does, we can cut your hair to be like hers too. How much do you think they’ll have to chop? Ten…eleven inches?”
“ Mimi !” My daughter sounded aghast, like she’d just been told they were cutting off a limb instead of hair. “I’m not choppin’ off my hair!”
“Why not? If you’re so interested in bein’ just like your best friend instead of your own person, that’s the first step.”
“But I like my hair how it is.”
“I’m glad to hear that. I like your hair how it is, too. And I like you just how you are.” My momma shuffled around in the kitchen, and I had half a mind to peek around the corner just to witness this bonding so I could study every minute detail of it in hope of recreating it myself. “You’re gettin’ to the age now when your friends are gonna be doin’ a lot of things you might not be interested in. And that’s okay. It’s good to have different interests. But now’s also the time when you get to figure out who you are and who you wanna be. And I hope when you’re figurin’ that out, you listen the most to that little voice in your head. Because it knows best how to make you happy.”
A sudden lump formed in my throat, a tightness in my chest that nearly had me stumbling. Much as I loved my momma for having that talk with Ava and reassuring her that she needed to make herself happy above all else, I couldn’t help but wonder where it’d been twenty-five years ago when I’d needed it. When I’d had others whispering in my ear about who and what I should be. So loud, they’d overpowered every single whisper of an inner voice I’d had.
Was it better or worse that the voice that changed me the most had been my daddy’s?
“I wonder where your momma is,” my mom said. “She out lookin’ after your sister?”
“Dunno. I thought she was right behind me.”
I cleared my clogged throat and prayed my eyes weren’t blotchy from unshed tears. I pasted on a smile, my heart aching over the possibilities of what could’ve been. And when I turned the corner and saw my mom and my daughter standing side by side working—something Ava hadn’t been interested in with me in months—my heart also ached over what couldn’t be.