93. Chapter 93
Chapter 93
For the next few months, as summer rolled along, Paige made the full transition from working crazy, long hours, to having seven days off a week and being able to sleep in until David’s alarm went off.
Not once had she ever imagined herself being someone who stayed at home, finding value and contentment in taking care of a child and a husband, but now that she was, she almost couldn’t imagine doing anything else.
Paige loved it.
Having unlimited time on her hands made things like cleaning up, doing laundry, and running errands seem less like time-sucking chores and more like … fun … especially now that she had Jacob with her full-time. After tendering her resignation at The Main Event, she’d floated the idea of pulling Jacob out of daycare (which he’d been going to while preschool wasn’t in session and she and David were both working), until pre-kindergarten started in September. She’d thought it would give her and Jacob a chance to strengthen their bond during quality shared time together, and she ended up being right.
It also gave her the opportunity to get Jacob involved in daily chores. She thought it was important for him to learn a little more responsibility and so she had him help with almost everything she did. She made sure to incorporate elements of fun into each chore, believing that laughing while doing a load of laundry or changing sheets on a bed made the tasks less tedious. Plus, it could cut chore time in half, she told Jacob, which would mean more time for other things, like going to the park, making Rice Krispies Treats, or drawing.
David loved it, too.
Having Paige at home was amazing, and it had nothing to do with him wanting to be ‘the provider’ or having her be subservient in any way. At first, it was mostly just about her not having to go to a job where she worked too hard and was completely unappreciated. However, it quickly became all about her doing whatever she wanted—and most of what she wanted to do appeared to include Jacob, which David liked to see. Under Paige’s supervision and care, the little boy really started to flourish, as did their relationship.
One day, when David came upstairs after work, it was to find that Paige had gotten Jacob a small fish tank for his room with a blue betta fish in it. They’d set it up on top of his bookshelf, and Marshmallow had parked herself next to it, tapping at the glass with a paw as her blue eyes tracked the swimming fish with predatory interest.
“Does it have a name?” David wanted to know.
“Fish Sticks,” Jacob answered.
David laughed at that before kissing Paige’s temple. “Looks like the Name Whisperer strikes again.”
“Nope.” Paige shook her head. “He came up with that one. None of my names were good enough, apparently.”
“Hard to believe you were lobbing bombs. What were some of your suggestions?”
“Well, at the top, was Jaws—”
“Nice. Love that one.”
“Then there was Fin, Sushi, and Moby—”
“As in Moby Dick, the book, and not the singer?”
“Exactly, but it was a little obscure for Jacob, since he hasn’t read any Melville, yet.”
“It’s also pretentious. I would’ve voted it down, too.”
She elbowed him in the ribs. “I liked Pesche, the Italian word for ‘fish’, but Jacob didn’t, so that got tossed. So did Rocky.”
“Rocky?”
“Bettas are ‘fighting’ fish,” she explained.
“Oh. Okay. Well, I guess it was time to pass the torch on to the next generation,” David told her.
“I guess so.”
Another day David came home to find them wearing matching white uniforms, tied at the waist with thick white belts.
“What’s going on?” he asked at the unexpected sight of them looking like extras from the show, Cobra Kai, which David and Paige had recently started watching. “What are you wearing?”
“We signed up for taekwondo lessons,” Paige said. “This is the uniform, or dobok.”
“Oh. Okay.”
“We were just trying them on to make sure they fit.”
Later, in bed, Paige went on to tell David that she and Jacob had been out running errands, and he’d seen someone who resembled Liam. “It wasn’t Liam, thankfully, but there was enough of a resemblance for it to be a trigger, and Jacob got pretty anxious. So, we ducked into a Starbucks and sat down with two pieces of lemon cake and talked for a little while. I told him Liam was never going to hurt him again, but then it felt like I was blowing smoke up his ass, because my saying that didn’t make him believe it. Not really. So I thought about how knowing a few defense moves made me feel better, and I figured if he learned a few, it might make him feel better, or maybe more empowered, you know? So, I googled nearby taekwondo studios and we went and checked one out … and then signed up for lessons.”
“That’s … I don’t even know what to say.”
“It’s a couple of hours a week, and it’ll be fun. Jacob needs to regain a sense of safety, and feeling like he has some control over it will help. I mean, obviously, he won’t take down a grown person—and he won’t need to, because he won’t be in that situation again—but it’s about being proactive.” She tapped her temple. “It’s mental.”
David pulled her close. “I don’t even know how much I love you,” he told her softly. “I really don’t.”
One day, right before Jacob was scheduled to start pre-kindergarten, David got home before Paige and Jacob did, and decided to start preparing dinner. When he heard them arrive fifteen minutes later, he went to the entryway and found them both looking like they’d gotten a lot of sun, their cheeks pink. He took a moment to admire Paige in her leggings and windbreaker, her hair up in two side poofs, making her resemble a teenager.
As she toed off her black Chuck Taylor’s, Jacob followed suit, and it was then David noticed for the first time that Jacob was wearing a smaller, identical pair.
Seeing David looking at the matching shoes with raised eyebrows, she shrugged. “He wanted some, so we bought a pair while we were shopping for school clothes.”
David noted how dirty the shoes were, and she added, “Then we had to break them in.”
He thought about how Ashley had never taken Jacob shopping, and everything he was wearing today had been purchased by Paige: jeans which now sported a tear in the knee, a shirt with a T-Rex on it, his short, tiny arms in the Put up your dukes stance, and a zip-up hoody. Every piece of clothing was also dirty, like Jacob had rolled down a grassy hill, fell into a pond, then crawled through a field of mud. He had traces of dirt on his hands and face—even some in his hair, which was hard to do, since it was only an inch long on top and basically shaved on the sides.
David had never seen his son this dirty, or happy.
“So, you two have been … clothes shopping?” David asked, somewhat dubiously.
Paige pointed to several shopping bags on the floor. “We shopped in the morning when the stores opened, then went to a new park that has some cool hiking trails.” She took off her windbreaker, then pointed to another bag. “And we collected a bunch of pine cones.”
“Oh. Why?”
“Because we’re going to make Christmas decorations out of them in a couple of months, obviously. Right, Stinker?”
“Right.”
“Sounds like you had a full day,” David mused, and as he gave Paige a quick kiss, he couldn’t help but notice her lips were tinted blue, as were Jacob’s. “Why are your lips blue?”
“We got blue raspberry Slurpees!” Jacob said.
“He’s kidding,” Paige quickly said, shooting Jacob a look, who made an Oops face. “Aren’t you?”
“I’m kidding.”
“Hmm. I can see I’m going to have to start a ‘Lie Jar’. For both of you.”
Paige turned to Jacob. “Uh oh. Your dad’s got that look on his face, so we’re in big trouble now—”
“What look?” David demanded.
Paige and Jacob both adopted exaggerated expressions of what was probably meant to be displeasure, but made them look more constipated, than anything.
David frowned, even though it was pretty hilarious. “I never look like that.”
Paige and Jacob busted out in peals of laughter, like it was the funniest thing they’d ever heard, grabbing their sides for good measure. When they were mostly done, Paige admitted, “Fine. We did get Slurpees. But it was in the name of hydration.”
“Hydration? That’s what water is for.”
“But water isn’t delicious like a Slurpee is,” she argued. “Right, Stinker?”
“Right,” Jacob agreed.
“And he’d never had one, which was a travesty that had to be rectified,” she continued. “So, I rectified it.”
Paige and Jacob exchanged a fist bump, complete with explosive sound effects.
David gave her a bland look. “You know, I’m surprised you didn’t try and blame the Slurpees on Jacob.”
“I thought about it, but I can only blame so many things on him. Plus, he’d already outed me, so I didn’t think it would seem plausible.”
“But you thought the hydration angle was plausible?”
“Well …” she trailed off to tap her chin with a finger. “I thought it was my best shot, all things considered.”
As if realizing that Jacob was practically dropping clods of dirt on the floor, she put her hands on his shoulders and steered him toward the hallway. “I think it’s time to clean up,” she said. “And this situation calls for a shower.”
David thought it actually called for a fire hose, but kept his mouth shut.
Paige took Jacob down to his bathroom to get the water going to the right temperature and set out a towel, while Jacob got clean clothes and brought them into the bathroom. Paige then stepped out of the room and into the hallway, giving him privacy to get undressed and take his shower.
To her surprise, David was standing there, obviously waiting for her. “How much time do you think we have?” he asked suggestively.
“Not that much,” she said, dashing his hopes. “You’ll just have to wait until tonight.”
He made a sound of disappointment. “That’s like hours away.”
“I know. But it’ll be worth it.” She pressed her hands to his chest and looked up at him through her lashes. “Especially since I picked up a new container of coconut oil from Costco the other day.”
“Hmm. Is that right?”
“That’s right. And I believe it’s your turn in the massage rotation.”
David nodded slowly, half of his brain already racing ahead to the evening’s activities, which would indeed be worth the wait, while the other half of his brain had but one thought: that he was the luckiest man on the planet.