Chapter 2
CHAPTER
TWO
AVERY
“Avery!” Gracie came running into the house, making more noise than should be possible for such a small person. She slammed into me like a ton of bricks. “Avery! Come and meet my mommy!”
I hugged her, a smile already plastered on my face, and looked up to see Johnny showing a young woman through the front door: Cassidy Moore, Gracie’s mom.
She was blonde, like Gracie, though her hair was a different shade.
Gracie’s and Johnny’s was gold—ripe wheat or afternoon sunlight—while Cassidy’s was more platinum.
She had a heart-shaped face, blue eyes, and the chill outside had brought a pink flush to her cheeks. She was beautiful.
Oh my god.
No wonder Gracie loved Frozen so much. Her mom was freaking Elsa.
“Hey,” Johnny said, one arm still around her as though there’d been a hug outside on the porch and they were just untangling it now. “Cassidy, this is Avery, my boyfriend. Avery, this is Cassidy, Gracie’s mom.”
“Hi,” we both said at the same time, and she gave me a hesitant smile.
“Hi,” I said again, holding out my hand. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“Hi,” she said again.
I was struck by how young she was, and how much younger she would have been when Gracie was born.
God. She and Johnny had just been babies themselves, and they’d both done an amazing job of working together to raise their daughter.
And I wanted to tell her that, to just open my mouth and gush about it, but even I knew how weird that would be.
And also how patronizing it could sound, even though I wouldn’t mean it that way.
I was a kindergarten teacher, though, and it was second nature to start a bunch of my conversations with “Your kid is great, and you’re doing a fantastic job.
” Usually it was to soften the follow-up, which could be anything from “I have noticed a couple of behavioral issues” to “How long has she been eating worms?” But this wasn’t a parent-teacher interview.
This was much more terrifying.
“Mommy!” Gracie exclaimed, pushing back from me and holding out her hand to Cassidy. “Come see my bedroom!”
“You have your own room?” Cassidy’s smile wavered just a little before it snapped back into place.
“Uh-huh! Me and Daddy have sleepovers sometimes. Come on.” She grabbed Cassidy’s hand and started tugging her toward the hallway. Cassidy and Johnny exchanged an amused glance before Cassidy followed Gracie, and there was so much in that shared look—a history that I couldn’t hope to compete with.
Not that this was a competition, I reminded myself firmly.
Cassidy was Johnny’s best friend as well as being Gracie’s mom.
Of course they were close. It was healthy for them to have a good relationship, for their sake as well as Gracie’s.
But a tiny part of me still felt like one of my kindergarteners when it was time to pair off for an activity and there was an odd number of kids, secretly convinced I’d be the one nobody picked.
“Mommy, Avery got me a Bluey blanket, and fairy lights, and a rainbow rug, and he reads me stories,” Gracie said, bouncing excitedly as she opened the bedroom door for her mother to see.
And there it was again, that shadow of uncertainty passing over Cassidy’s face.
I lingered in the doorway as Gracie showed off her stuffed animal collection, which was admittedly a little out of control.
What could I say? I spent a lot of time at Walmart, and my boyfriend’s daughter was adorable.
Sometimes random toys fell in my cart. And it wasn’t like I only gave Gracie stuffed toys.
I made sure she had plenty of books and craft stuff as well.
Cassidy picked up a stuffed unicorn and turned it over in her hands before returning it to its spot on the bed. “I love your room, pumpkin,” she said.
Gracie beamed at her, then said, “Mommy, I’m thirsty.”
“I have juice boxes,” I said and quickly added, “or water. Whichever your mom says you can have.”
Cassidy gave me a look that was mostly grateful. “I think it can be a juice day, baby.”
“Yay!” Gracie went running to the kitchen and we followed her.
Five-year-olds didn’t have much of an idea about boundaries, and it wasn’t long until Gracie was giving Cassidy a tour of the place.
She pointed out the little pots of herbs on the kitchen windowsill and the chart on the refrigerator that got a sticker whenever she helped water them.
She wrenched open the kitchen drawer to show Cassidy the brightly colored child-safe knives that she used to help with cooking.
Then, clutching her juice box, she pulled Cassidy toward the living room to show off the blanket she liked to wrap up in to watch movies.
“Avery! We have more decorations!”
“Mmm,” Johnny said. “Avery went a little overboard while you were at Grandma and Grandpa’s place.”
I flushed, catching Cassidy’s gaze. “Um, maybe just a little?”
Cassidy showed me a polite smile. “It’s very nice.”
God. I’d overstepped, hadn’t I, in a million different ways?
It was one thing to welcome Gracie into my home, but decorating a bedroom for her?
Putting up a chore chart? Buying specialty kitchenware?
It was too much. Did it feel to Cassidy like I’d just steamrolled my way into Johnny’s life and, by extension, Gracie’s too?
“Who wants some sugar cookies?” I asked, too brightly.
“Me!” Gracie exclaimed, jumping from foot to foot. “I do!”
I took the opportunity to escape to the kitchen, taking way longer than I needed to arrange the sugar cookies on a plate.
When I got back to the living room, Cassidy was sitting in the armchair with Gracie in her lap, and Johnny was sitting on the couch.
Well, sprawling, in that long, easy way he did.
His legs were stretched out, and one arm rested along the back of the couch.
He looked relaxed and happy, laughing at something Cassidy had said.
“Mikey was always an idiot,” he said. “I’m not surprised.”
They were already at the part of the conversation where they reminisced about old friends and old times and things I didn’t have a clue about. Great.
“That’s what I said when Britney told me,” Cassidy said, her eyes bright. “You know it was Mikey who slashed your tires after the game with Hopewell, right?”
“What? Fu—fudge off! I won that game for the team!”
“And Mikey was always jealous of you,” Cassidy said.
“Oh, man.” Johnny snorted and shook his head. “I loved that truck, though.”
Cassidy’s smile faded. “Sorry.”
“Eh.” He shrugged, but there was a tightness in his expression now, the weight of an old unhappiness that would never entirely vanish.
The only truck Johnny had ever mentioned to me was the one he drove now with the heating about to die, and that was usually only to list its many mechanical issues.
I was sure the one he was remembering had been nicer.
I guessed that when Johnny had been kicked out by his parents, that nice truck had stayed behind.
I sat down on the couch beside him and set the sugar cookies on the coffee table. Gracie scrambled down from Cassidy’s lap and grabbed a bunch.
“Don’t spoil your dinner,” Johnny said and looked at me. “What? No but it’s Christmas?” His mouth quirked and he said to Cassidy, “Avery’s crazy about Christmas. All the usual rules fly right out the window.”
“Ha,” I said with a weak smile, avoiding Cassidy’s gaze. Way to tell the mother of your child that not only do I put rules in place for her kid, I also let her break them just because it’s Christmas.
“So, you stay over here a lot, right?” Cassidy asked softly.
“Yeah,” Johnny said. A flush crept up his throat. “It’s, um, it works better for Gracie’s schedule, I guess. Danny and the twins work some weird hours, so, yeah. And we like to be here.”
“I like my room!” Gracie said, her face full of sugar cookies. “And Avery is the best! He makes good spaghetti!”
“I’m sure he does,” Cassidy said. She reached out and took a cookie, turning it over in her hands.
This was like the most awkward parent-teacher interview in the world. Worse, because usually the parents were trying to make a good impression on me, but this time I was the one in the hot seat, and although I couldn’t be sure, it seemed like I was failing to impress Cassidy at all.
And the worst part was, Johnny wasn’t picking up on the awkwardness. He tugged the hair at the nape of my neck like there was nothing weird at all about doing that in front of his ex and the mother of his child, and then said, “Do you ever hear from Christina?”
“Not in ages,” Cassidy said. “Last I heard she was getting married to some guy in the Marines?”
“I wonder if this one’s gay too.”
Cassidy laughed. “Oh, come on. She was sixteen and Danny was the only study partner who hadn’t tried to grope her in the library stacks. Of course she was in love with him.”
“I guess the bar was pretty low at our school,” Johnny agreed.
I both did and didn’t want to know who Christina was and whether or not she’d found the straight guy of her dreams. But asking would be like waving a giant flag that said “Hey! I don’t belong here!” so I kept quiet.
Then, just when I was afraid I might be expected to contribute to the conversation after all, Johnny’s phone rang.
He pulled it out of his pocket and said, “Chase, what’s up?
” He listened for a moment. “Oh, sh—shoot. Okay, have you turned it off at the main? No, it’s the valve out front—you know what?
Give me two minutes.” He ended the call and stood.
“What’s up?” I asked.
“The faucet in the shower’s busted and Chase can’t turn it off. I’m gonna go take a look.”
“Daddy, can I come?” Gracie asked. “I want to see you fix stuff!”
“Get your coat on,” Johnny said. “You can help me by passing me the tools I need.”
Gracie cheered and bolted from the room.
“I’ll be back as soon as I can,” Johnny said and, just like that, he left Cassidy and me together.
Alone.
Great.