Chapter 12
NINA
Nina was running late. Just a few minutes, but still. She’d been working until the last minute and ended up sprinting around the house, grabbing things to get ready for pick-up. She pulled the door open, purse in hand and shoes on, and came face-to-face with Theo.
“Ready to go?” he asked, like they did this every day.
“You’re coming?”
“Of course.” Theo stepped back to let her exit. “The pick-up line is a great place for networking. I’m hoping to see Charles Ackley once more before I reach out.”
“Right. That makes sense.” Nina tried to pretend she wasn’t disappointed. Part of her had hoped that Theo had come just because he wanted to spend time with her and Jack, but that was silly. Theo had been clear from the moment she’d met him — his work came first, end of story.
“Ready?” Theo repeated. She nodded, and they went out to the car together. On the drive over to the school, she tuned the radio to her favorite pop station and hummed under her breath.
“How was your day?” Theo asked.
“Good, mostly,” Nina said. “I got a lot of work done. How was yours?”
“Not bad.” They smiled at each other, and for a moment, Nina felt like they were a real married couple catching up after a long day of work. Then she remembered that they weren’t and turned up the radio to prevent further conversation.
After a few minutes, they arrived at Holyoke Academy. Jack came running up to the car and jumped in, grinning from ear to ear.
“You’re early,” Theo said.
“Guess what, guess what?” Jack asked excitedly.
“What?” Nina asked as both adults turned back in their seats to look at him.
“I won a spelling bee!” Jack said, brandishing a certificate with his name on it and a raised gold-foil seal. “And we had choir auditions, and I got in!”
“That’s wonderful!” Nina held her hand out for a high five, and Jack slapped it.
“Great job,” Theo added. He gave the little boy a high five too. “We should celebrate.”
“Ice cream?” Jack asked.
Theo and Nina exchanged a glance. Nina shook her head imperceptibly.
“How about dinner out?” Theo suggested.
“Yay!” Jack bounced in his seat. “At JJ’s Diner?”
“That’s his favorite restaurant,” Nina told Theo. “It’s where we go for his birthday every year.”
“JJ’s Diner sounds perfect,” Theo agreed. “Let’s go.”
“Yay!” Jack bounced more. It was hard to convince him to put his seatbelt on so they could start driving, but eventually he did.
The whole way to the restaurant, he kept up a steady stream of happy chatter, telling them all about the audition and the spelling bee.
Nina gave directions to the diner, which was in a part of town by the bay that Theo hadn’t been to before.
“I had to sing a song, and I didn’t know one, but the teacher helped me,” Jack said. “And she said I have a beautiful voice!”
Nina beamed at her son. “You sure do. I’m so proud of you. I didn’t even know you were auditioning.”
“Me neither,” Jack said. “But my friend Yassar was going, and I wanted to help him because he was nervous. So, then I auditioned too. We both got in! Sam can’t come because he’s already on the soccer team after school.”
“Helping your friend sounds like a very superhero thing to do,” Theo said.
Jack sat up a little straighter on his booster. “Thanks.”
When they arrived at the diner, Theo parked, and they all got out. The lot was almost full. Jack skipped towards the door, Theo and Nina following after.
“Family of three?” the smiling waitress in a blue uniform with a white apron asked once they were inside.
“Yes, please,” Nina said. She escorted them to a table, and Theo looked around.
It was a theme restaurant. All the waiters and waitresses were dressed in eighties clothes, there were records on the walls, and a jukebox played in one corner.
He smiled as they took their table. It was sweet that this was Jack’s favorite restaurant.
“This is the best day ever,” Jack said. He picked up one of the glossy plastic-covered menus and flipped it open. “I’m in the choir, I won the spelling bee, and we’re eating out. We never eat out!”
Nina blushed. Out of the corner of her eye, she glanced at Theo. “It’s expensive. And we do eat out sometimes, for birthdays.”
“Those are the best meals to eat out for,” Theo said.
“Exactly!” Jack grinned, and Nina relaxed.
“What’s good here?” he asked.
“I like the fish burger,” Jack said brightly. “And Mom gets breakfast for dinner because she loves pancakes.”
“I do love pancakes,” Nina agreed.
“So do I,” Theo smiled at her. “But today, I think I’ll go for the chicken pot pie.”
The waitress came over a few minutes later to take their orders and smiled at Jack. When she left, Jack started making a fort out of sugar packets. Immediately, Theo joined in.
“You need to reinforce this wall,” he told Jack. “Otherwise, the dragons will knock it right down.”
“Dragons?” Jack’s eyes lit up.
“Oh, yes. There are lots of dragons in these parts.” Theo raised his eyebrows at the little boy.
“Oh, no,” Jack said. “Mom, are you scared?”
“I’ll try to be brave,” Nina said. “With my SuperJack around to protect me, I can’t be too scared.”
“That’s good. And don’t worry, Theo isn’t really a supervillain.”
“Good to know.”
Jack and Theo built a fort, then knocked it down and built another. When their drinks came, Theo showed Jack how to tear off the end of the paper straw cover and blow it at someone else, which made Jack laugh and laugh. He kept trying to chase the paper cover to do it again.
Usually, Nina wasn’t able to take her eyes off her son, but today, she couldn’t help glancing at Theo, too. He looked so handsome when he let his guard down and played with Jack. She’d thought the same thing at the brunch when she’d seen him playing on the slide with Jack and his friends.
The man Nina had run into outside his office, the man with his neat suit and arrogant turns of phrase, seemed completely different from the man now playing table soccer with a rolled-up paper napkin.
When the food arrived, Jack fell onto his fish burger like a starving boy who hadn’t eaten in decades. Theo and Nina exchanged a smile.
“Where do you usually go when you eat out?” Nina asked as she poured syrup onto her pancakes.
“I don’t eat out much either,” Theo admitted. “You know about my private chef. And if I want lunch or dinner out, I usually have it ordered to the office so that I can work while I eat.”
Nina frowned. “So, all you really do is work and work some more, huh?”
“Hey,” Theo threw the paper-napkin soccer ball at Nina. “I do plenty of other things.”
“Like recruiting fake families?” Nina suggested.
Theo laughed. “Sure. And I travel.”
“For work?”
He lowered his head, smiling. “Yes. I was hoping you wouldn’t ask that.”
Nina giggled. “I mean, I understand — all I really do is work and spend time with Jack. But that’s because I don’t have any other option. You do.”
“Not really, not if I want to keep Epsilon afloat. I worked so hard to build that company, and stepping away would mean it would fall apart.”
“So, has taking a little time with me and Jack this week made the company fall apart?” She raised her eyebrows in challenge.
Theo chuckled. “No, but that’s different. I’ve set people up so that they can work without me, and I’m working at night after you’re both asleep.”
“Me too,” Nina said. “I’ve been working after Jack’s bedtime.”
“You should come join me then,” Theo said. “We can have a little coworking space in my office, keep each other on track.”
Nina smiled at the thought of a nighttime working party with Theo.
Then she remembered the last after-hours hangout they’d had, drinking champagne while celebrating Jack’s Holyoke Academy acceptance, and how close she’d come to a kiss.
It was probably better to avoid one-on-one time with the handsome billionaire.
With that in mind, she dug into her stack of pancakes. She also had hash browns and bacon, as well as a small dish of fruit.
Theo tried his pot pie and nodded approvingly. “Not bad.”
“How’s your burger, Jack?” Nina asked.
“Yummy,” Jack said with his mouth full. He was still bouncing in his seat.
He took the last bite of the burger and, while finishing off his fries and soda, he told them more details of the audition.
Nina was glad. The more Jack talked, the less she and Theo would, and the less she needed to worry about getting too close to him.
“The choir has big kids, too,” Jack was saying excitedly. “There’s even one really big boy!”
“How old is he?” Theo asked.
“I don’t know, eight, or maybe even a teenager,” Jack said, like a teenager was some kind of exotic creature. “Big.” Theo glanced at Nina, and she smiled at him. Once again, she felt the warmth of being the adults in the room, sharing in the cuteness of the child between them.
“Will you have performances?” Nina asked.
“Yeah, one big performance for Thanksgiving.” Jack’s eyes lit up. “The teacher said she’d choose one kid to sing a solo. Maybe me! But maybe one of the big kids.”
“That’s very cool,” Nina said.
“Are you gonna come?” Jack asked Theo.
“Of course.” Theo scooped up another bite of his pot pie. “I wouldn’t miss it.”
But Nina’s heart turned over. Thanksgiving was six weeks away, and Theo already had Charles Ackley’s business card. There was a decent chance that he’d have landed his contract by then and would have no use for Nina and Jack anymore.
Nina bit her lip as she looked down at her son, who was sipping soda through his straw and kicking his legs beneath the table.
She cared about Theo more than she’d expected to, but Jack seemed to think Theo was the best thing since superhero capes.
What if Jack’s heart was broken when Theo inevitably achieved his business goals and they left?
“I’ll be there, too,” Nina said brightly. “And we can go out for dinner again afterwards.”
“Of course you’ll be there, Mom,” Jack said. He smiled up at Nina. “You’re always there.”
Nina ruffled his hair. “I am. And I always will be.”
They finished up their dinners and drove home. It wasn’t very late yet, so Nina took Jack to burn off some energy running around the backyard. Theo headed into his home office to work, reminding Nina that she was free to join him later if she’d like to.
Nina spent the evening playing the part of a giant lizard monster who SuperJack was trying to defeat, the two of them running around the yard until they collapsed on the grass.
Overhead, the sky was turning to dusk, with bright reds and oranges visible between the tree branches.
The air was cool, but not yet cold, and they were both wearing sweatshirts.
“Will we live here forever?” Jack asked, turning his head to look at Nina. His blue eyes were shining.
“No, buddy, not forever,” Nina said. “Just for a little while. But don’t worry. We’ll always live together.”
“Okay.” Jack looked at the sky again, “I like it here.”
“Me too, buddy.” Nina took his small hand and squeezed it, “But wherever I’m with you, I’m happy. Because I love you…”
“To the moon and back!” Jack completed the phrase. “I love you too, Mom.”
After a while, she carried Jack inside and got him ready for bed. They read a few stories before she tucked him in and turned out the lights. In her own room, she hesitated. Theo was in his home office, working, and he’d invited her to join him. Part of her wanted to.
A stronger part knew she’d be better off in her own room, focused on her own work, so she put on her pajamas, got in bed, and opened her laptop.
She made a few calls to clients on the West Coast, where it was still early evening, then went through past orders and got everything organized for the following day.
With the urgent tasks out of the way, she opened an advertisement for a freelance graphic-design position.
It had been a while since she’d put her graphic-design skills to use, but she applied for the position anyway.
Now that money was less tight, she could take a risk on something new without jeopardizing her son’s future.
That felt good.
It almost felt good enough to outweigh her nerves about what would happen in a few weeks or a few months, when Theo landed his contract and it was time to leave.