“This is the weirdest guys’ night I’ve ever been to.” Brandon Brown reaches across the table for the carton of chocolate milk and pours some into his glass. “Really fucking strange.”
“Shut the fu—fudge up,” I tell him. “You can’t swear with a kid in the house.”
The rest of the guys have the good sense not to respond. They’re too busy shuffling their cards and eating the cupcakes I set out for them on a plate in the middle of the table.
All right, maybe I’ve gone overboard. It’s the first time I’ve been left in charge of a kid, so I didn’t feel right cracking beers and putting some violent-ass hockey game on TV.
“Is there seriously not anything else we can watch?” Sean grumbles. He reaches across me to grab a hunk of salami off the charcuterie tray he brought, and I’m grateful I invited a chef. If it weren’t for him, we’d have nothing but sweets to snack on.
Brandon frowns at the TV as he shuffles his cards. “What are we watching, anyway?”
“Yo Gabba Gabba.” Dr. Bradley Parker shuffles his cards on the other side of the table. “Watched a lot of this when I did my pediatrics residency. This is the one where they sing Party in My Tummy.”
“Excellent,” Sean mutters. “Now I know the theme for that bridal luncheon I have to do next week.”
Dr. Parker—I should probably just call him Bradley—laughs and studies his cards. He’s new to the group, hired on recently at one of the local clinics. I haven’t talked to him much, what with all the worrying about Libby and Chelsea, but Austin says he’s a good guy.
“Look on the bright side,” Austin points out as he helps himself to a pomegranate buttercream cupcake. “At least we get to play poker and not pattycake.”
James is standing by the fireplace scowling at his phone, having already folded for this hand. He looks up long enough to frown at something else on the other side of my couch. “Is that animal supposed to be shitting in that box?”
“Don’t say shitting,” I tell him. “It’s a rabbit. And that’s his litterbox.”
And this is my life. How the hell did that happen?
I should probably feel weird about it, but I just feel—happy?
Sean snorts beside me. “Ask Mark what his rabbit’s name is.”
I glare at my brother. “Ask Sean how old he was before he stopped wetting the bed.”
I have no idea if that’s true, since Sean and I grew up on opposite sides of the country with mothers who couldn’t have been more different if they’d tried. But he shuts up anyway, and I wonder if I’m getting the hang of this brother thing. Maybe my fake-it-‘til-I-make-it strategy is working.
“Whaddya got, bro?” Sean throws some poker chips into the middle of the table and lays his cards down. “I’m calling you.”
Well damn. I sigh and toss my cards down.
“I’ve got Jack shi—shart,” I admit, spreading out my cards to display the lousiest hand I’ve had the whole game.
Normally, this is where I’d cheerfully invite him to go fuck himself in the spirit of friendly poker play, but instead I say “nice job.”
See? I’m catching on.
“Ha!” Sean scrapes the chips toward him, looking downright cheerful. “I knew you were bluffing. You’re a shitty liar.”
“Don’t say shitty,” I grumble, ignoring the rest of the insult. Sean knows better than some what it’s like to hide a secret. He spent the better part of his life covering a pretty big one for his mom. What would he think if he knew about mine?
“Gotta say, I always wanted this.” Jonathan hoists his glass of chocolate milk in a toast. “Brotherly poker games, belching and farting, all the guy stuff I never got. Maybe I’ll move out here with the rest of you bast—bastions of brotherly love.”
A lump forms in my throat, and it’s not because I feel sorry for Jonathan being raised with six half-sisters. It’s the look he just exchanged with James, a look that says the two of them know something I don’t. I turn toward Sean in time to see him glance away fast.
What the hell?
Before my paranoia can take over, Austin’s phone buzzes. He and Doc Parker are the only two not banned from having phones at the poker table, and he frowns as he looks at the screen. “Deal me out, please.”
He stands up and strides fast into the kitchen, and I wonder if it has anything to do with Chelsea. That’s probably wishful thinking on my part. I want them to nail the bastard who’s been turning her life upside down, who’s scaring an innocent six-year-old for no good reason.
I know I shouldn’t, but I watch Austin’s face as he talks, trying to read his lips. Was that Charlie he just said? Not like I can read lips, so it could be anything.
“Hey, kiddo, what are you doing up?”
I whip around to see Sean peering down the hallway. In the time it takes for Libby to emerge, I do a fast rewind through the last two minutes of conversation. Pretty sure none of us have said anything too shitty.
Libby trudges sleepily into the room wearing a pair of fuzzy pink pants and a white shirt with cartoon pictures of ducks. Her feet are bare, her hair is rumpled, and she looks so damn adorable my heart gives a painful squeeze.
She does a bleary blink at the table full of men, taking inventory of the strangers before her gaze lands on me. Her face brightens, and she scurries forward, rubbing her eyes.
“I had a dream.” She clambers onto my lap like she belongs there, and my arms go around her by instinct, like they’re thinking the same damn thing.
“A dream, huh?”
She nods, blessedly unworried by the roomful of strange men she’s never seen before. “I was eating clouds because they tasted like cotton candy,” she continues, snuggling against my chest. “And then a dog came and peed on them, and I was sad so I cried, and now I need grape soda.”
Well, shit. I can’t argue with that logic.
Or can I?
“I don’t think you’re supposed to have sugar after bedtime,” I say, pretty sure that’s right. “How about some water?”
“Okay.”
Sean jumps up to go get it, and I nod my thanks as Lib keeps talking. “The bed is really soft, but it would be softer if Long Long Peter slept with me.”
Also, true, and also not a great idea. Maybe my kid instincts aren’t so bad.
“How about another blanket?” I offer. “I’ve got a fuzzy red one my mom gave me when I moved in here. She said everyone who owns a mountain cabin needs a fuzzy blanket.”
“Your mom sounds nice,” she says. “Where’s my mom?”
She sounds more curious than worried, but I keep my voice gentle anyway. “She’s having fun with her friends,” I tell her. “Like I’m having fun with my friends.”
Libby surveys the assembled men, most of whom are studying her like she’s some kind of zoo animal. No, that’s me. They’re looking at me like this is the oddest thing they’ve seen all week.
“Looks good on you,” Jonathan murmurs, meeting my eyes.
Over by the fireplace, James nods. “You’re a natural.”
I try to think of some smartass answer, but I don’t want to get Libby asking questions. She squirms in my lap to look up at me, her hazel eyes nearly melting my heart. “Sing to me?”
“Sing?”
I say it like she’s just asked me to stand up on the table and punch myself in the nuts, and I do my best to backtrack. “Uh, I don’t really know any—”
“Yeah, sing.” Sean grins, getting me back for that bedwetting joke. “What’s that one you taught me that one summer we were out here together?”
Shit, he’s right. There was one summer we wound up visiting Dad at the same time. I was ten, and Sean was maybe eleven, on break from some fancy summer camp. James was there, too, and they both kept yammering on about shit they’d learned at boarding school. I wasn’t jealous, exactly. I just didn’t have much to contribute except some dirty jokes and a few goofy songs I’d learned at school.
“Something about humps,” Sean prompts, and I start to stand so I can punch him.
But Libby claps her hands together and bounces. “Alice the Camel. That’s my favorite song.”
No shit? “Um, wow.” I scrub a hand over my beard. “I’m not sure I remember how—”
“Alice the Camel has—” Lib claps, her small hands smacking together with surprising force. “Ten humps!”
It’s coming back to me now, this silly childhood tune that seems ridiculous now. As a ten-year-old, I probably just liked the excuse to say “hump” without my mom washing my mouth out with soap.
Libby’s still going, and apparently, so is the damned camel.
“…so go, Alice, goooo,” she hoots, really getting into it now. “Alice the camel has—” She stretches up and claps the sides of my face with both hands, shouting the words up into my face. “Nine humps!”
I can’t help it. The kid’s energy is contagious, and so is her joy over this ridiculous song.
“Alice the camel has—” I clap my hands, muscle memory taking me back to the edge of the pond where I taught this to Sean and James so many years ago. They were older than me and laughed their asses off, but I didn’t care. I was so fucking happy to know something they didn’t, even if it was some lame-ass kids’ song.
“—Nine humps.”
A pang of guilt hits me about shouting “hump” in front of a kid, but I think it’s okay in this context. Lib’s having a ball, clapping and singing and smacking her hands in my beard every time she gets to another hump.
The other guys start getting into it, too, whacking their hands on the table and joining the singalong. They’re all wearing dorky grins, and I remember what Brandon said about this being the weirdest guys’ night in history. But he doesn’t seem to mind as he claps and joins the next verse.
“Alice the camel has—” clap! “—six humps.”
Even James loosens his tie and starts nodding his head in time to our tuneless melody. Austin’s taken his phone conversation outside, and I realize I’d forgotten about all of it. The bad guys, the bloodlines, all the reasons I’ve told myself I couldn’t have a wife and family.
In that moment, I almost think I could do it.
“Alice the camel has—” clap! “—no humps, so noooow Alice is a horse!”
All of us finish in a shouted chorus of voices I’m sure they can hear down at the lodge. There’s even a last-second tenor harmony thrown in that I’m pretty sure is James, even though he’s not moving his lips.
When the last note fades, Libby claps her hands together and squeals. “You have to come to my birthday party and sing.”
“Um,” I say, regrouping. “When’s your birthday party?”
“June five,” she reports matter-of-factly.
And just like that, the lump is back in my throat. June fifth. That’s almost three months away.
I’m back in my childhood bedroom, the evening of my eighth birthday. The covers are pulled up to my ears, even though it’s still light outside, and my mother wears a worried look as she comes in to check on me.
“How are you, baby?” She sits on the side of my bed, stroking my hair while I pretend not to cry.
“He said he’d be here,” I sniffle, rubbing my cheek against the soft flannel of my pillowcase. “He said he’d come to my party.”
“I know he did, sweetheart,” she soothes, her voice comforting but not surprised. Not by that point. “Sometimes men are disappointing. Women, too,” she adds quickly as an afterthought, but I know she doesn’t mean it.
Men are the ones who leave people crying. I know that even then.
“My dad promised,” I sniffle, hating myself for crying because I damn sure couldn’t hate him. “Is he not coming because of Joe?”
Joe, that was his name. I’d almost forgotten. My mother’s boyfriend at the time, one of several she had over the years. That was another conversation I’d eavesdropped on, knowing damn well I wasn’t supposed to hear.
“I’m not coming if your damn boyfriend’s going to be there,” my father muttered, pacing in the living room of the small house I shared with my mom.
“That’s your choice, Cort.” My mom was using her calm voice, the one she used with her pre-school students. “But I want you to think very hard about how Mark is going to feel.”
“Think about how I feel,” my father snapped. “How many times do I have to ask you to marry me before you’ll—”
“—ignore my own wishes and give in to yours?” My mom made a tsk sound I recognized from the last time I’d tried to convince her to serve cookies for dinner. “I love you, Cort. I’ll always love you on some level, and I appreciate that you take care of us. But we both know you’ll never be faithful, and I deserve more than that.”
My father muttered some more choice curses, but even then, I knew my mom was right.
That didn’t make it any easier to have both men—my dad and Joe—fail to show for my party.
I know it’s stupid. I know my fragile, eight-year-old heart should have healed by now, but it wasn’t about the birthday party. It was learning dads could come and go. That mine could vanish in an instant, snatching away everything I believed about my father, about my family, about myself.
Blinking back the memories, I realize Libby’s still looking at me. Her hazel eyes are wide as she waits for an answer.
“Your birthday’s a long ways off,” I tell her, dodging the question like the asshole I am. “A lot can change by then.”
“Not family,” she says. “Family doesn’t change.”
I can’t breathe. I can speak or blink or even swallow. It’s like my whole body is paralyzed, and I don’t know what to do.
It’s Doc Bradley who notices, probably realizing I’m on the brink of some medical meltdown. He stands up and shuffles toward the kitchen, even though it’s the first time he’s set foot in my house. “Who wants more chocolate milk?” he asks.
Libby tears her eyes off me and gives a little squeak of joy. “Yes, please.”
The birthday invitation is forgotten for now, at least by Libby. Not by the asshole who can’t even answer a kid’s innocent question with anything other than bullshit.
“I’ll take some more,” I mumble, nodding my thanks to the doc.
Sean stands up, too, ready to refresh his charcuterie tray, but mostly to escape the awkwardness of the moment. Or maybe that’s my imagination, because he puts a hand on my shoulder and squeezes when he walks past.
I’m still wondering if I should say something to Libby about the birthday thing when Austin walks back into the room. He looks at me, and I can tell something’s wrong. I lift an eyebrow, and he shakes his head. It’s a wordless conversation that translates roughly as “What the fuck?” and “Not now.”
On my lap, Libby yawns. She tries to cover it, but I scoop her into my arms and stand. “Pretty sure you’re supposed to be in bed,” I tell her.
“But my chocolate milk—”
“I’ll bring it to you in just a minute,” I assure her as I carry her down the hall to the guest room.
I start to tap the light switch with my elbow, then notice Chelsea plugged some kind of nightlight thing into the outlet beside the bed. The mom-ness of the gesture is so sweet and thoughtful that my chest fills with the same warm glow pouring from the star-shaped light.
And then I feel like an asshole all over again, because I’d never in a million years think of bringing a nightlight. Or knowing what songs to sing. Or how not to leave a kid crying in six months if things don’t work out between her mom and me.
“There you go,” I tell Libby as I stuff her under the covers and do my best to tuck them up around her face. “Snug as a bug in a rug.”
It’s something my mom used to say to me, and it makes Libby giggle. “Can I have a story?”
“A story?” I fumble though my brain trying to remember one. “Cinderella had this nasty stepmother and evil stepsisters and one day she went to a ball in a pumpkin and lost her shoe but kissed a prince and in the end they got married.”
Libby blinks at me. “That was fast.”
“Yeah.”
“Maybe next time you could use a book?”
Next time? I love this kid’s faith in me. Or in the world at large, as a thing that might not end up disappointing her. “Next time,” I say, wondering if there will be one.
“Good night, Mark.” She stretches her arms up straight, and for a second, I’m not sure what that’s about.
A hug, dumbass.
I lean down to embrace her, breathing in the sweet scent of strawberry shampoo. God, what I wouldn’t do to deserve the kind of unconditional affection this kid doles out like it’s free. Like it’s not the riskiest, scariest thing in the whole damn world.
“Good night.” I breathe the words like a prayer, feeling her go slack in my arms like she’s already drifting off to sleep.
When I draw back, her eyelids flutter closed like they’re weighted by sandbags, and she sinks into that kind of heavy, effortless slumber you can only enjoy when you’re six.
“Sweet dreams,” I whisper, wishing it was really that simple.