Chapter 22 #2
I smiled fondly. “My grandmother. I always think of her whenever I think of Lebanese food.”
“Do you ever visit Lebanon?”
“Haven’t had the time.” Or the money until recently. “Plus, there isn’t anyone left to visit since Teta died.”
“What about your mom?” he asked tentatively. Because he was broaching the subject carefully, I assumed he already knew. Something must be wrong with me if I didn’t find the invasion of privacy as infuriating as I used to.
“We don’t keep in touch. She left Baba when I was young and got remarried. Never saw her again.”
Kai’s face was blank. If he felt sorry for me, he didn’t let it show. “Is that why you moved to America?” he asked.
I nodded. His expression remained attentive, making it easy to keep talking. “My parents split when I was little, and Baba had business here, so we moved.” It was the start of my misery. Lebanon was full of life and family. America was lonely. That was until I met Stefan.
I glanced at Kai and found him already watching me. No, not watching. He ogled me shamelessly, his gaze dropping to my lips every so often as if he had no idea what he wanted to do to me. It was so direct that I had to look away.
I glanced at the fire instead, which crackled loudly. Outside, the ocean was churning, constant and unhurried. The house was otherwise quiet. Or so I thought, right up until it wasn’t.
A small thump came from somewhere upstairs. Then the unmistakable sound of feet, plural, rapid, competitive, on the staircase.
“Amelie!” Bella’s voice preceded her appearance by approximately four seconds. She burst through the door in her pajamas and skidded to a halt on the hardwood.
“Oh my gosh. What are you doing up?” I looked at the wall clock.
“I missed you.” This came out less as an explanation and more as an accusation. They were asleep by the time I got home, and I didn’t tuck them in.
“We couldn’t sleep,” August announced from the doorway, with the tone of someone providing relevant context.
Jamie rubbed his eyes as they made their way to us, piling onto the couch.
I knew the kids were making it up. They looked visibly half asleep, and Jamie had arrived wearing one sock.
It was evident they had been fast asleep and had woken to the sound of voices.
I didn’t have the heart to scold them, though.
They had been homesick, and after seeing the living room furniture, I realized how much I empathized with the feeling.
On top of that, tomorrow I have to break the news that Kai and I will be taking them to the amusement park instead of Stefan.
Although I hadn’t confirmed the plan, I knew I could count on Kai, something I could no longer say about Stefan.
“Want me to tuck you in?” I asked Bella.
“No, I want to play Pictionary,” was her counter.
“It’s late,” Kai told her in a gentle letdown voice.
Three sets of eyes turned to him with the unified, unimpressed expression of children who had decided bedtime was a construct.
“Please!” Bella pleaded.
“How about I read you guys a bedtime story instead?” I offered.
“Pictionary,” Bella repeated, entirely unmoved.
“Just one game,” Jamie begged.
Pictionary was their favorite. Before moving to this house, we played it every Friday.
“We can play tomorrow night,” I told them, and looked to Kai for backup but found none. He had disappeared into the hallway, reappearing twenty seconds later with the board game in hand.
Bella’s eyes lit up.
“Kai!” I chided.
He gave me a guilty half smile. “They’re already up.” He watched Bella wrestle the box onto the coffee table with great amusement.
“One round,” I relented.
“Unlimited rounds,” Bella said without looking up.
“One round.”
“Two.”
“One!”
Bella looked at me, considering my offer with great seriousness. “Deal.”
We ended up on the living room rug. Kai sat with his back against the couch, long legs stretched out, and Bella installed herself directly beside him in the proprietorial manner she had developed over the past few weeks.
The twins took the other side of the board.
I pulled the blanket off the couch and wrapped it around my shoulders.
It was me and August versus Kai, Bella, and Jamie.
Jamie drew first. He was given the word elephant and produced something that looked like a potato with ambitions.
“Horse,” Bella guessed.
“Mountain,” she tried again.
“Elephant,” Kai said, five seconds in.
Jamie pointed at him. “Yes.”
“That looked nothing like an elephant,” August protested.
“I saw a trunk,” Kai said.
“That was the tail.”
“It had trunk energy,” Kai said.
Jamie, who had been awarded the point, was trying not to look smug and failing entirely.
August drew next. He was given umbrella and drew what appeared to be a mushroom wearing a hat. I guessed it right before the timer ran out, and only because Kai had murmured “Umbrella” into my ear.
He was deliberately letting the kids win points, which only made them even more obsessed with him.
“If you keep letting them cheat, this game will never end,” I whispered to him during the break between turns.
“I’m not cheating. Just giving them an unfair edge,” Kai said.
I laughed. “August drew a mushroom.”
“A mushroom with an umbrella’s spirit.”
I stared at him. “That is not how Pictionary works.”
He shrugged. But when Bella’s face lit up like a small sun after Kai let her have another undeserved point, I decided cheating in board games was an acceptable flaw in a man.
Jamie laughed at something August had drawn. Bella was leaning against Kai’s arm with her fez tipped sideways, and the room smelled of fire, wine, and lasagna still faintly in the air. The kids were relaxed, and they looked happy.
By the second round—because they twisted my arm into another—Bella had stopped keeping score, which she had been in charge of.
Instead, she was drawing things unprompted on the back of the scoring sheet.
She showed me the picture she was drawing of her family.
It was the five of us standing side by side.
We were all the same height except for Kai, who was significantly taller.
Kai decided it was fridge-worthy, while I rolled my eyes.
Of course he thought it was refrigerator-worthy—he was clearly the hero of her drawing.
As if the height wasn’t enough, Bella had drawn a cape on his back.
It was much later in the night when I realized that Bella didn’t draw Stefan into her perfect family.
The problem was that none of us noticed it, either.