28. Emerson
EMERSON
Leave it to a four-year-old to completely blow my cover.
“Did she?” Mateo asks Crew, but he’s looking at me, one eyebrow raised and a stupid, far-too-amused smirk tugging at his mouth.
Crew nods eagerly, completely unaware that he’s just thrown me directly under the bus. “She told me she listens to your songs every night!”
My eyes widen.
“Crew,” I whisper, squeezing his little hand in mine as we walk.
“What?” he asks, looking between us with genuine confusion.
Mateo’s grin only grows as he looks back at me. “Every night?”
I feel my face start to heat, and then I get even more embarrassed about being embarrassed, and my cheeks flush. “That is not what I said.”
“It’s not?”
“No.”
Crew immediately shakes his head. “Yes, it is.”
I glance down at him. “Whose side are you on?”
Mateo chuckles, the sound warm and effortless, and I hate how quickly it makes me forget I was just trying to defend myself.
“So, buddy, what else did she tell you about my songs?”
Crew thinks hard, his little nose scrunching. “She said your voice is her favorite because it helps her fall asleep.”
The smile disappears from my face for half a second—not because I’m embarrassed anymore, but because the words are so much more honest than I ever intended to be.
Mateo notices.
Of course he does.
His teasing expression softens just slightly before he looks back down at Crew.
“Well,” Mateo says just as the crowd makes it to the Survive Alive House. “I think your nanny might have pretty good taste.”
I roll my eyes, but I can’t stop the smile that slips through.
Thankfully, Anderson and Jack turn to face the kids who have created a circle around them and start to explain how the Survive Alive House works—how the kids can go through in small groups, each led by one of the firefighters.
I kneel down next to Crew. “Can you see?’ I whisper.
Crew shakes his head, so I stand up to find Jack’s gaze, pointing down at Crew so he knows to keep an eye on him for me.
I lean back down to Crew. “Okay, champ,” I point towards Jack, “that’s my brother, and he told me he needs a really good helper today. Do you think you’re up for it?”
Crew eagerly nods, like I just asked him if he wanted to go to Disney World.
“Do you want to go be his helper?” I ask.
Without another word, Crew slips his hands from mine and Mateo’s before squeezing through the crowd until he finds Jack.
Anderson is helping the kids gather into groups as Jack gets down to Crew’s level and holds out his hand. Crew smiles as he shakes Jack’s hand, and it’s honestly the cutest shit I’ve ever seen.
My grumpy big brother’s soft smile as Crew proudly stands next to him is a picture I commit to memory.
And selfishly, I had to get rid of the kid before he told Mateo anything else I’ve told him over these last two months.
I turn to Mateo, his brown hair blowing in the wind, the tips of his cheeks tinged red from the cold air. He’s wearing a vintage denim jacket and black baggy jeans, his facial hair fuller than it was the last time I saw him.
Maybe I didn’t think sending Crew Jack’s way completely through.
The kid is usually a pretty good buffer for Mateo and me, and I think the two of us need a damn good buffer after how we left things between us.
The crowd around us disperses as the small groups of kids begin to go through the house with one of the firefighters. Some of the parents and guardians watch as their kids stick their heads out the windows and wave, while others remind their children to be patient as they wait for their turn.
There’s a sense of chaos happening all around us, but somehow it all feels muted. Like the rest of the world has faded into the background, leaving me focused only on Mateo—the nervous shift of his weight between his feet, the way his eyes move from me to the snow and
back again, the way he shoves his hands into his pockets only to pull them out seconds later.
Part of me wants to break the silence between us.
The other part of me has no idea what to say.
“I’m sorry about the other night.” Mateo’s voice is low, his eyes on the ground before he tentatively lifts his gaze to mine. “I shouldn’t have flipped out on you like that.”
I shake my head. “It was my fault. I wasn’t watching where I was going.” My mind goes back to that night, the beginning of the worst depressive episode I’ve ever had—and how I’d still probably be in that bed if Jack didn’t find me there.
“You seemed pretty out of it,” Mateo offers, and I know it’s his way of asking without actually voicing the question.
“Christmas was a hard day for me.”
Mateo nods, and I have a feeling he hears the words I don’t say. “Did you end up spending time with your family?”
“I did,” I answer. “It was nice, but it was honestly really exhausting.”
“Family time has a way of doing that,” he replies knowingly.
“What did you do for the holidays?” I ask, slightly changing the subject to him just for a moment to gather my bearings.
“I spent Christmas Eve at my sister’s house to spend some time with my two nieces, and then I drove down to Chicago the next morning to see Crew with Talia and her husband.
” He pockets his hands, his eyes going to the snow underneath his boots.
“And then remembered I wanted to drop off your Christmas bonus.”
“Which you really didn’t have to do,” I offer, taking a page from his book—prompting the question without actually asking it.
Why did you come all the way to my apartment?
“I didn’t have stamps,” he says, as if it’s an acceptable answer. As if he couldn’t have waited to give it to me when his tour started back up or, I don’t know, buy fucking stamps.
“I wasn’t expecting company,” I reply, as if my answer is any more acceptable.
We’re doing that weird thing again, where we talk in code.
“Look, Emerson,” Mateo says after a moment. “Like I said that night—” he pauses abruptly at the mention of the night he’s referring to.
The memories tucked in the back of my mind, where I’ve tried to put them over and over again, just to pull them out constantly—just to relive it. Even when I know I shouldn’t.
Mateo clears his throat before continuing. “I know it’s none of my business—you’re none of my business.”
He doesn’t say it harshly, but the words sting regardless. I try to ignore the pain, but it’s a good reminder that our one night together was just that.
One night.
“But I can’t help but care about you,” he admits, and my breath catches.
“I mean, I just—I don’t know how to explain it,” he stumbles out, dragging a hand over his mouth before continuing.
“I guess that’s the only thing I know for sure.
I care about you, Emerson, and I’m here for you.
” He swallows, letting the words hang in the air before adding, “As a friend.”
“I’m not always the best friend,” I admit because I truly don’t know what else to say to his admission, and I can’t quite get myself to say what I want to say: that I care about him too.
As a friend.
“I’m sure Crew would argue otherwise,” Mateo smiles, and the mention of Crew settles some of the tension in the air.
“He just likes me because I remind him of his cat.”
“His cat, who now lives with me,” Mateo laughs, almost like he can’t believe the words himself.
My eyes widen. “Is she coming on tour?”
Mateo shakes his head frantically, eyes wide. “Not if I can help it.”
The change of subject is refreshing, but it doesn’t mean I’m not still thinking about his words.
I care about you, Emerson.
“I need to find someone in the next twenty-four hours to check in on her every day while we’re gone,” Mateo continues. He goes on to explain how he can’t handle the cat on the tour bus because it hates him, but I interrupt him when an idea hits me.
“Wait, my friend’s sister,” I say.
“What about your friend’s sister?” Mateo says before I can even finish my sentence.
“If you’d let me talk,” I playfully slap his shoulder, and he dramatically reels back like I actually hit him with enough strength to move him. “I would tell you that Ava’s sister, Georgie, is looking for a job. She’s already helped out with their neighbor’s cat.”
Mateo’s eyes lit up, and it reminds me of Crew.
The two boys have the same look of excitement, and I don’t like what it does to my chest.
We figure out that Ava and Anderson’s place is a short bike ride from Mateo’s house, and I send a text off to Ava with the job offer for Georgie just as Jack shouts my name over the conversations surrounding us.
Mateo and I look over to Jack, who points at Crew. He signals that it’s Crew’s group’s turn to go through the house, so we make our way closer to the house to make sure he can see us if he checks to see if we’re watching.
My phone buzzes in my pocket.
Ava
She’s in
As long as she can go after school since Winter Break ends tomorrow
Anything for Mateo Lane, right?
I roll my eyes at Ava’s texts before dropping my phone back into my jacket pocket.
“Ava says Georgie can do it,” I tell Mateo just as Crew sticks his head out one of the windows, his eyes immediately finding us and waving his arm over his head.
We wave back just as Mateo says, “Thanks. It’s one less thing for me to worry about.”
“What else does the great Mateo Lane have to worry about?” I ask, our eyes fixed on the Survive Alive House.
“Oh, nothing,” Mateo answers with a sigh. “Just the usual midlife crisis stuff. Turning forty. Figuring out what happens when I’m not the frontman of a band anymore.”
I turn to look at him, and he looks just as surprised as I feel.
I don’t think he meant to let those words out. But that’s the thing about the thoughts we keep buried—the ones we replay over and over in our own heads. We spend so much time giving them a voice in private that eventually, they forget they’re not supposed to be spoken aloud.
“And here I am thinking you were trying to figure out how to use your newfound sexual confidence.” The joke comes out so naturally, yet I will never get used to how easily it is to get Mateo all hot and bothered.
He rubs the back of his neck with his palm with an awkward chuckle. “Waking up to find you gone without a trace the next morning didn’t do much to my confidence,” he admits.
“Had to leave you wanting more, rockstar,” I tease, but this time, the joke doesn’t land as well.
“Daddy!” Crew’s voice rings out over the crowd, followed by a fit of giggles as he runs over to us. “I did it! I made it through the Survive Alive House!” he says, holding up a red ribbon and a certificate.
Jack follows close behind him.
Mateo kneels down to catch Crew as he barrels towards him, wrapping him in a hug that lifts him off the ground.
“I’m Mateo,” he says to my brother once he sets Crew back down, holding out his hand. “Thanks for taking him through the house.”
“Jack,” my brother says as an introduction, shaking Mateo’s hand. “And no need,” he adds. “Crew was actually the one to lead me.”
I look down at Crew. “You?” and he nods his head so fast I’m worried it might pop off. I reach down, brushing a few strands of hair away from his face. “Always the best helper.”
He wraps his arms around my legs, and my heart stutters—almost like it trips over itself at the unexpected affection.
Crew has hugged me before, but this feels different.
Maybe it’s because of today. Because of Mateo’s grin or the way Jack’s usually stoic expression softens as he looks at us. Maybe it’s because this morning, I put on this pink sweater my mom loved without falling apart.
Maybe it’s because when you let yourself feel the sadness, anger, and grief instead of running from them, the happiness that finds you in the spaces between feels different.
Lighter.
More powerful.
And so much less lonely.