Chapter 10
SPENCER
By the time I’m driving up to my house, Hadley is out like a light. My neighbor Ford is busy unpacking his car. I wave at him as we pass. We're good friends too, and when we're both in the city for our teams, then we often meet up.
“Ford Spears is looking mighty fine.” April looks on with wide eyes, but I get a sense that she is trying to rile me.
I sit a little taller in my seat. “Doubt it.”
“Huh, I knew that his house was finally ready to live in, and he apparently now lives there, but he looks a lot hotter in person than what you see online.”
Ford plays hockey and spent a lot of his childhood in Lake Spark too. Being in his late twenties and with his short haircut and trim physique, it gets a lot of attention from girls, apparently April included.
“Down, girl, I’m confident he is waiting for someone.”
“Jealous?” She looks at me, amused.
“No… Hey, doesn’t Pickles need a walk?” I change topics as I pull us up in the driveway.
“Yeah, he does. Should I wake Hadley?”
Parking the car in the garage, I turn the engine off. “Nah, it’s okay, I’ll do it. She needs to wake up or she won’t sleep later.”
A minute later, I’m peeling Hadley slowly off the backseat and into my arms, resting her head against my shoulder. I’ll wake her once we're inside and I set her on the couch.
I notice that April is staring at me, her eyes fixed on the scene.
“You okay?” I whisper. “You look like your cold heart might actually be thawing.”
Her lips quirk out. “Just noticing that… it doesn’t matter.” She twirls around and heads out of the garage before I can figure out what is crossing her mind.
I don’t spend time trying to figure out where April’s head is at, because I have my little girl wrapped in my arms. I have no illusions, I know that this won’t last forever; Hadley is growing at record speed.
When I lay Hadley on the sofa in the living room and she begins to grumble as I slowly wake her, I feel like she is at a stage of life when I’m enemy number one. The teenage years already spook me, and we're not even halfway there yet.
“Come on, sweet pea, time to wake up.” I tuck her hair behind her ear, but her little hand swats me away.
“Grr.”
Her sounds only make me smile to myself because she is adorable.
“It’s not even dinner time yet.”
She slowly pulls herself up to sitting and rubs her eyes. “Can I watch a movie?”
“That’s all you want to do,” I note.
“Because you’re not good at playing with dolls or drawing.”
Hadley isn’t afraid to speak her mind, sometimes ruthless, but I can’t even be mad. She has a point, I’m not great with playing, and I feel relief every time a babysitter comes to help out and play with Hadley.
“We can go outside to play. Want to throw the ball around?” I suggest.
“No. It’s always me watching you practice throws.”
“I can go gentle, grab the tee-ball set.” I hear the eagerness in my voice.
She shakes her head in disagreement. “I don’t like baseball, I like ballet.”
I really struggle to find a mutual interest to bring us together. I’m the hard-ass who keeps my head in the game, and I don’t have it in me to play dress-up or dolls.
“You had fun today, right?” I hear that I’m concerned on all fronts today. “I thought you wanted to go to Pioneer Park.”
“I did have fun. April helped me find all the good places and pull you along.” Hadley shuffles on the sofa to dangle her feet off the edge.
I scratch the back of my head. “Right. April.”
“She's a fun friend.”
“That she is.” Damn it, she's outshining me. Maybe April staying here is a bad idea. I should be focusing on my relationship with Hadley, not adding extra roadblocks.
Hadley surprises me when she cuddles against my arm. “Don’t worry. You’re still really good at reading me stories, and you have connections to the tooth fairy, you promised you did.”
A warm smile hits me as I loop an arm around her little body to bring her closer to me.
“I do have connections,” I promise, because I know that phase is coming soon. Grabbing the remote from the side, I put on the screen to the streaming service. “Let me guess, Encanto?”
“Uh-huh.”
Pressing play, I soak up this moment with Hadley, reminding myself that I’m trying.
The sound of dishes moving in the kitchen causes me to glance behind me to see that April must have been listening or watching, although she's pretending to focus on whatever she is creating.
A while later, with Hadley well into the movie and my tolerance for songs at a peak, I leave her with a blanket and head to the kitchen that is now empty.
Grabbing a water, I station myself at the kitchen counter and begin to skim my tablet, heading to the online toy store.
I tap my finger on the screen as I debate what in the world I could buy that maybe Hadley and I could both enjoy.
The smell of sugar hits me, and the feeling of another person walking behind me fills my body with a full feeling.
April walks straight to the oven to open the door and check on something, not saying anything to me in the process. When she seems to approve of whatever is cooking in the oven, she looks up at me and throws an oven glove to the side.
“Everything okay?” She rolls her lips in.
“Yeah, just looking at toys.”
“I meant you escaped Encanto. Is it because you got to the scene about the abuela?”
“No,” I say, defensive.
Her eyes narrow in on me “Really? Because I heard a rumor that you get emotional during that scene.”
“Absolutely not.” Or yes.
“Alright, I’ll let it go, but I know your secret.” She laughs. “And toys? You don’t need more toys, you have plenty of those.”
“I know, but something I could do with Hadley.” I look into the other room then back at my tablet. “What about Princess Legos?”
April offers me a soft smile. “I really think she has enough toys in her special room.”
I begin my search in the bar of the website, but then excitement takes over me. “Maybe I should have someone install a ballet barre in her playroom.”
“Now that is a perfect idea. She will go crazy,” April assures me.
Something else dawns on me, a memory. “Aren’t you the ballet pro?”
Our eyes catch because she knows I’m referencing that night.
“You twirl and bend like one, anyhow,” I add.
She raises her brow but says nothing. I notice her cheeks blush a shade of pink. I pause for a beat and look at April who is watching me intently. “What’s cooking?”
She blinks a few times. “Oh, that. Uhm, just a macaroni cheese bake, and truffle potatoes with chicken for the adults. Didn’t have it in me to make stew or anything pioneer themed.”
“It sounds good. What time is dinner?”
“Should be in twenty minutes, but I’m going to leave you two at it. I'm going to work on some things on my laptop.” She seems to want to avoid us, and for some reason, that disappoints me.
April ignores us for the rest of the night, and it causes me to toss and turn when I should be sleeping.
When I wake, I seem to run harder for my morning workout, as if something is bothering me, which makes sense considering my current life predicament.
Standing on my dock on the lake after my brutal run, I pick up a baseball from the basket of many and throw it out across into the lake. I do this on repeat to relieve stress.
“Whoa, isn’t this a waste of baseballs?” I hear Ford approach me, as he must have been on a morning run.
He jogs in place once he reaches my spot.
“Sorry. It’s been a hell of a week.” I stretch my arms over my head then throw another ball. “This is no different from golfers and their golf balls.”
“Fair point. Nothing to do with the woman who was in your car yesterday? She looked familiar.”
“April?”
“As in Hudson’s niece?” He brings his foot up behind him to stretch his quad.
“Yeah, she’s staying with me for a little bit.”
He makes a winding gesture with his hand. “Hold up. You clearly haven’t told your best friend what the hell is going on.”
“She’s the one.” He looks at me, as if I need to offer up another clue. “As in the one from the wild night I had after Hudson’s and Piper’s baby shower.”
Ford laughs deep. “Oh man, does Hudson know?”
I shake my head. “Trust me, it was one night only.”
“Then why the fuck is she living in your house?”
“A complication arose.”
His eyes grow big. “Like a nine-month-later complication?”
“No. As in 'we kind of did something and need to ensure nobody sees it' complication.”
Ford now laughs hysterically.
“It’s not funny.”
“Yes, it is. Everyone knows that with a good lawyer you'll be fine. I mean, how many guys on my team have done something stupid and nobody ever found out? It is way too many to count.”
Raking a hand through my hair, I know he's right. “Anyhow, it’s a temporary stay, and we argue most of the time.”
“I do remember you mentioning you’re not a fan. But why did you invite her to stay? You never let women near Hadley.”
“I didn’t have much choice. Besides, I can get away with saying she is a friend to Hadley since she's always around Piper and Hudson.”
Ford bobs his head from side to side. “Maybe.”
“Maybe what?”
He touches my upper arm. “You’ll figure it out. I need to run, get my shake, and head back to the city.” He begins to run in place.
“Don’t forget about the charity dinner later this week,” he says as he runs backwards. “You are expected not to come alone,” he calls out.
I wave him off in the air with a little two-finger salute.
I take my time with a cool-off walk back to the house, making a mental note that I only left the house because I knew April was there in case Handley woke, which clearly happened as I hear them in the playroom as I walk past the hall. I backtrack a step but stay hidden as I listen.
“So, what should a princess expect?” Hadley wonders. They're sitting in her little tent with books scattered around on the floor. My daughter is still in her pajamas, whereas April is ready for the day in jeans and an off-the-shoulder sweater while she strokes Pickles' head.
“That her prince decorates the room with candles and makes it a special evening when he asks her for her hand in marriage. Most definitely not in their apartment while they wait for a taxi to pick them up and he suggests they get married.” I can hear the truth in her voice.
Honestly, it kind of sounds like Jeff’s proposal, well… sucked.
“Hmm. Should there be cake?”
“Maybe. The prince should go all out on grand gestures.”
“Can the princess be happy without both parents at her wedding?”
April’s shock at the question is apparent in her pause. “Why, of course. What makes you ask that?”
“Because I only have a daddy.”
“And? I only have a mommy; well, she found her prince recently, but he isn’t my dad. Anyways, I still have every plan to be happy on my wedding day.”
“Why don’t you have a dad?”
“I was specially chosen by my mom. Sometimes we only have one parent, and that just means they have more love to share. I’ll let you in on a little secret.” I can hear her pretending to whisper. “They normally give us extra cookies because they want us to be happy.”
I laugh softly, before I clear my throat and make my presence known.
They both look up at me.
“There you two are.”
“He’s up.” Hadley doesn’t sound thrilled.
April swipes Hadley’s ponytail to the side. “Yes, because your daddy works extra hard to stay in shape to make millions of dollars off of throwing balls so he can buy you all the cookies in the world to show his love.”
Why do I feel like a melting puddle of goo? And why does it not filter through my brain when I tell April, “Throwing a curveball at April makes my day complete, which is why you’re coming with me to this charity dinner later this week… as my plus-one.”