Chapter 10
NIA
T here is no way that I can afford this house. Even on my salary, this is a pipe dream if I’ve ever seen one.
The building before me is two stories high with pillars on either side of the entrance, the windows are wrapped in crown molding and the lawn is landscaped, luscious and green in a way that I would never be able to maintain on my own.
It’s gorgeous.
“Nia?” A woman asks as she approaches, wearing a brilliant smile. Her hair is dark and has an incredible shine to it, like she’s some kind of living shampoo ad or something. “Edie Porter, it’s so nice to meet you.”
I take the hand that she offers me, giving her a firm shake and a smile. “I hate to cut right to it, but…I have to ask about the rent on a place like this.”
Her eyes flick toward the road behind me, where a beige SUV has pulled in front of the house. Out of the driver’s seat, bathed in the afternoon sun, climbs Brody Montgomery. His sunglasses are exchanged for the normal specs that I usually see him wearing before he closes the door and approaches the two of us.
He’s got on a pair of casual slacks and a dark blue button down is tucked into them, which hugs his body as he moves to hug the woman I’ve just met.
“I see that you’ve met Edie,” he tells me with a smile.
“She’s your…”
“Sister,” the woman tells me.
My eyes flare, quickly moving between the two of them. He wants me to move into his sister’s house? With my five-year-old child?
“Rent isn’t an issue,” Edie tells me, as if she can feel my internal freakout as her own. “I don’t need the income.”
“I’m waiting for the catch.”
“No catch,” Brody insists. The two of them move toward the house, and I follow, as if pulled by some invisible chain. “You need a safe, Daniel-proof place. Edie has one to give.”
Despite the size of the house, as soon as we step inside, I feel warm. This isn’t just some house, this was someone’s home .
There are a few pieces of furniture scattered throughout the house; a couch and matching armchair in the living room, but no coffee table. A dining set smaller than I would expect to find in a house of this size sits in the dining area. It’s intimate; close and comfortable for a small family, or maybe for a couple who needed a quiet date night at home for themselves.
The only bed in the house is in the primary bedroom, a plain mattress which rests on a dark four-poster frame. I’d like to think that I’ll swap it out for something more my taste if I actually move in here, but who am I kidding? I’ve been so busy since Dan and I split that I had to go back to shaving, because I couldn’t carve out an hour in the day to see my wax lady.
Swap out the bed frame, I mock myself with an internal roll of my eyes.
“No rent, no utilities…?” I finally ask.
“No,” Edie says with a shake of her head. “Just enjoy the house with your daughter. They grow up so fast, you shouldn’t have to spend so much of that time looking for a place to live .”
My eyes move to Brody, who seems pleased with what his sister’s just told me.
“So yes?” He asks. “Or are we looking for something else?”
We?
“I mean, yes,” I nod. “This place is perfect.”
“Good,” he smiles. “Then I’ll leave you two to it.”
As he moves to pass behind me, his hand grazes ever-so-lightly against the small of my back. While his sister tells me things I’ll need to know about the house, I glance over toward his broad frame as he pulls open the front door; just barely catching him looking over his shoulder at me before he leaves.
I could swear the corner of his mouth ticks up.
I could swear that it makes me blush.
“This is heavy, Mommy,” Katie whines from her place next to me.
She hefts her small box of coloring supplies in both arms as the two of us trek from our car to the front door of the house.
“I know, Katie-cat,” I tell her, “but you’re doing such a great job helping.”
Like a trouper, she helps me carry our things into the house, dropping each box into its designated room before I get a juice box for her and she finds herself perched on the couch with it. I use the remote to click through a few channels until I land on some safe-looking cartoons for her.
Normally, I would let her play a puzzle game on my phone, but it’s been completely off-limits to her since her little closet phone call with her father. That call led to questions that I don’t know how to answer, and it’s painful in a way that I’ve never felt before every time that I try.
I don’t want her to know how ugly things are. I don’t want her to know that Mommy and Daddy are fighting. That her world is anything less than cupcakes, rainbows, and butterflies like she deserves.
Losing my marriage, being betrayed…those things are hard to cope with. Taking away a piece of my daughter’s innocence is impossible.
With her juice emptied, Katie follows me up to her new bedroom, which has good bones, but is still devoid of life. We drop her box of toys in one corner and her craft table in the other, which we load up with her art supplies.
“Mommy,” she says, tugging on the hem of my shirt. “Can I have a yellow room?”
Smiling down at her, I tell her, “Yes, you can. The nice lady who owns our house said you can decorate however you want to.” Combing my fingers through her thick tawny hair, I tell her, “You know what? We should bake some cookies to tell her thank you. And maybe some for Mommy’s friend, too.”
“Chocolate chip?” She asks excitedly.
“How about chocolate chip and oatmeal? Just in case.”
Scrunching up her face at my nasty, grown-up-flavored offering, she nods, and I drop to press a kiss to the top of her adorable, tiny, wonderful head.
This may be the first time in months that I’ve felt like we might land on our feet. That we stand a chance at really walking away from this without any lasting wounds.
I guess I have Brody to thank for that.
An hour later, we find ourselves at the kitchen counter, the two of us splattered in flour and egg yolk as we knead our bowls of dough – mine oatmeal, because the texture is ‘icky,’ and Katie’s chocolate chip, because she thinks that she might be able to steal a nibble of the dough if I turn away for ten seconds.
She doesn’t get the opportunity.
We work together, rolling neat balls of dough and setting them onto baking trays. Katie marks a few of the chocolate chip cookies with a fork before we slide them into the oven, so that we’ll know which of the cookies are hers once they’re finished.
I haven’t had time like this with her in so long. I feel like I’ve missed so much. So many small, but still important, things. I resent my husband for that; for breaking our home, my heart, the precious and too-short time that I got to spend at home with my daughter.
In this moment, I weigh the option of quitting my job. They would replace me before I even left the parking lot; why am I letting them take me so far away from her?
Because you have to, I remind myself.
After pulling the treats from the oven, we let them cool before I hand Katie a spatula and three plates to slide the cookies onto. I watch as she dutifully performs her task, sticking the tip of her tongue between her lips as she focuses on not letting them drop.
Wrapping my arms around her shoulders when she’s finished, I squeeze her tightly and drop a kiss to the back of her head.
“You are my whole wide world, Katie-cat.”
I promise I’ll do my best to keep yours from falling apart .