19. Van
Van
T rue to her word, she stayed. We showered together, where I had to scrub sap out of her hair, and I made it worth her while afterward by bending her over the rim of the tub and taking her.
As we collapsed into bed, she tucked her head between my arm and my chest and ran her fingers over its sparse hair, coiling them around her nails.
“I wish it could be like this forever.”
Forever. Such a terrifying concept. Never in all the years of women, sex, and short-term girlfriends did that word come into play.
I waited for the familiar dismay to grip me, the icy warning that it was time to unlace my arm from her shoulder and send her on her way. Rolling the word around in my head, forever , forever , playing for keeps.
Did I want that with Summer?
Instead of fear, a warm sensation seeped over my skin, a small glow that started in my chest and radiated out into my fingers.
I pulled Summer closer.
Is this what it felt like to fall for someone? A new anxiety crept in. Would she feel the same way?
With that on my mind, I drifted off.
I woke with her still in my arms. After pressing a kiss to her forehead, I slipped out of bed.
As I made my way downstairs, I hummed to myself.
The night before confirmed a lot of theories I had about Summer and why she was so closed off. As I knew, she was hurt by him, and it would take a while to earn her trust enough to be let in. My actions would have to do the talking.
With that, I busied myself, making breakfast.
My normal routine of sweet cereal wouldn’t be enough. I had to break out the big guns of bacon and eggs and toast. She mentioned the night before that, while she wasn’t supposed to go into the hotel, she needed to stop by later to check on new furniture set to arrive. That meant I only had a few hours with her before she’d have to leave me again. But we’d make a plan for dinner afterward.
No noise rustled from upstairs, so I tidied up for when she would wake. I even cut a rose from the bush and set it in a small vase I had found under the sink.
In the living room, an alarm pinged from her charging phone.
As I picked it up to silence it, her screen opened. I was surprised to find she didn’t have a code. On the screen was a list half checked off.
Goat ad
Gym pictures
Butterfly attack
STI notice
Lost dog
Cheating proof
Fraud
As the items on the list went on, they got worse. I could never understand what went on in a woman’s mind, and this bizarre list was one I would file away under Summer being Summer.
With a garbage bag in hand, I stepped out onto the porch. The door hadn’t even closed behind me when I stopped in my tracks to see a familiar old truck pulling in.
Our eyes met, and it was too late for me to turn tail and go back inside. Inside, where a beautiful Summer was sleeping naked in my bed. Inside, where I could hope to be a better man for her.
Instead, I stood on the front porch, waiting for my father to descend from his ridiculously lifted truck.
The years had not been good to him. His once-shiny dark hair, laced with stringy gray strands, was in desperate need of a trim. His brown eyes, once so mischievous and clear, were rimmed red with puffy bags.
He groaned loudly as his feet hit the pavement. “Donovan. Long time no see.”
His statement rolled out as if we were old friends, as if my last words to him ten years before weren’t a vow to never see him again.
“Bruce.”
I affected a flat tone.
He ambled up the walkway, his hands in his pockets.
He was thinner, sporting a new bicep tattoo of an anchor with Refuse to sink in block letters.
“How you been, son?”
Gripping the bag tight, I considered how much of a mess it would be to dump the trash over his head.
It was a juvenile thought, but if you can’t feel juvenile about your shitty parent, when can you?
“Fine.”
He rocked back on his heels. “You gonna invite me in? It’s my house, after all.”
“No. It’s Mom’s. Passed down to her by her father. Her name was on the deed. I’ve been paying for the upkeep for over a year now.”
“And who paid it for years before that?” he asked with a smirk.
“Was that before or after you were fucking your nineteen-year-old assistant?”
He chuckled. “Oh, come now. We’re past all that, aren’t we? I get why you were miffed at the time. You were a kid, and I’m sure it was confusing for you, but you’re a man now. You get how the world works.”
“So, maturing to you is having free rein to cheat on your chronically ill spouse?”
He flapped a hand at my argument. “Glyn is over all that. Seems happy enough—”
“No thanks to you.”
He frowned that same thin line from when I would ask him for help with my homework as a child. The only thing he ever taught me willingly was car maintenance.
“Look. Was I perfect? Of course not. No one is. But me and your mom, it’s complicated. But that doesn’t mean you and I can’t patch up this squabble.”
“I have nothing to say to you.” Pushing past him to the garbage can on the side of the house, I lifted the lid and tossed in the bag with more force than necessary.
“Van, come on. Don’t be like this. I came over here to see if we could tal—oh, hello there.”
Slamming the lid with a deafening clang, I glanced over to the porch.
Summer was standing there, arms wrapped around herself, wearing my old University of Washington shirt.
In any other circumstance, I’d be ecstatic at the sight. But her long tanned legs on display and her hair a glorious mess were more than I could handle in front of my father.
“Bruce Logan, Donovan’s father.”
Summer took his hand, hesitation flickering on her face. “Summer.”
He turned to face me, Summer’s hand still in his. “Well, she is a looker, ain’t she? Nice work, son.”
Before he could step closer, I rush to her side, pulling her hand free from his and stepping between them. “Go inside, Summer.”
“But—”
An irritated expression crossed her face, and I could tell she rankled at being ordered around.
“Please,” I hissed out between my teeth.
Scowling at me, she turned on her heel, muttering, “Fuck you very much.”
Alone on the porch, I crossed my arms. From my spot two steps up from him, I towered above.
“Nice work, champ. Seem like you take after me in more ways than one. Of course, we always knew how to attract the pretty ones, don’t we?”
“I’m nothing like you.”
He chuckled at me. “Of course you are. You’re a Logan, after all. Ladies love us. That one, though—phew. I bet she’s fun to have around.”
My feet and hands were moving faster than I could think. One moment, I was standing on the porch and the next, my father was slammed against the side of the house, his shirt in my fist as I spewed, “Don’t you say another fucking word about her, or I will bust your teeth in.”
“Alright, alright.” He put his hands up in surrender. “No more talking about your pretty little girlfriend.”
Smoothing out his shirt, he shook his head. “That’s no way to treat your old man. Can’t say I’m not impressed with how strong you are, though. You work out?”
This entire exchange was getting too ridiculous.
Sinking onto the front step, I cradled my head in my left hand. “Can you tell me why you’re here so you can leave?”
He rocked back on his heels again as if I hadn’t just threatened him with bodily harm. “Tracy has been on me about patching things up before the baby comes.”
My hand dropped from my face, and I stared at him, dumbstruck. “The what? I sure as shit hope I heard you wrong. My fifty-eight-year-old father didn’t get someone pregnant.”
“Strong swimmers.” He grinned at me. “She’s four months along. It’s a boy.”
“Un-fucking-believable.” I shook my head. “You can’t seriously be telling me this.”
“Well, I thought you’d want to know you’re going to be a big brother.”
“Big brother? Big br—I’m thirty-two years old. The time for younger siblings passed twenty-five years ago. You can’t think that I’d have anything to do with you, whatever floozy you found, and the spawn you created.”
“Don’t you disparage Tracy like that.”
“No, you don’t. Get off my lawn. Stay away from Mom, away from Summer, and away from me.”
“I thought you could be a man about this, but I guess not.” He sniffed as if I was the out-of-line one. “You know where to find me when you want to be a part of this family.”
Glaring until his taillights were pinpricks in the distance, I stood in my driveway, my arms crossed.
I stomped inside the house and slammed the front door, rattling the stained glass window.
Summer was seated at the bar, sipping coffee from the teacup I had so diligently washed fifteen minutes before.
“What was that about?” she asked, nibbling on a corner of toast.
“Nothing.”
“Doesn’t look like nothing.”
“You don’t want to talk about your shitty ex, and I don’t want to talk about my shitty dad,” I snapped. “Just taking a play out of your book, right?”
Her eyes flashed dangerously, and she dropped the toast on the plate and leaned back on her stool, scoffing. “Whoa. You want to try that again?”
Clenching my fists, I shook my head at her. “Drop it, Summer. I don’t want to fucking talk to you about it.”
Summer set her teacup down softly, her jaw set and lips a thin line. “Cool. I’m leaving.”
“What—no, don’t. I—”
“No, I am. You obviously don’t want me here, and watching your little tantrum was too much.”
“But you’ll come to trivia again, right?”
She sighed. “I don’t know. We’ll see.”
“How are you getting home? I drove you here.”
Clicking her tongue at me derisively, she shrugged. “I’ll walk. I don’t know.”
“You’re not walking. I’ll take you home.”
Her eyes narrowed, but she nodded. “Fine. But I don’t want to hear a word out of you on the way home.” With that, she grabbed her little bag by the door and walked out.
The drive was silent. When I tried to say something, she would put her hand up and say no.
My offer to walk her up to her apartment was met with a door slamming in my face.
Watching her make the three-story trek up the stairs, I scrubbed my face, the day-old scruff abrasive on my palm.
I screwed up. The words left my mouth, but I was too pissed off at my father to say the right things.
I vowed to patch this up later.