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He smacks his forehead the second it hits him. “Oh, God,” he groans. “They’re named after emo vampires? I’m gonna kill Maya. Jesus. That’s just what every burly boxer wants, pets named after teenage – Oh my God.” He rubs his hand through his hair in frustration.
I can’t stop laughing. “You planted that seed when you named Bella. And I wouldn’t call you burly. Lumberjacks are burly. You don’t have enough facial hair or flannel to be a lumberjack.”
“Do you prefer the term ‘manly’? Would I qualify as a manly boxer?”
I try to stifle my giggles. “I can’t believe you didn’t catch on. You didn’t think it was weird she wanted to name a cat Edward Edwards?”
“She’s ten. I was happy she didn’t want to call him Mr. Fuzzy Boots.” He drags a hand over his jaw. “I have to change his name.”
I shake my head. “Nope. You agreed, and he knows his name. Just because you didn’t recognize Maya’s intent doesn’t mean you can change it now.”
He purses his lips. “A nickname. I’ll come up with a nickname.”
The sun is dipping behind the nearby rocky peaks when we return. “The girls want pizza. Let me call in the order and we'll start the movie,” he suggests.
“Sounds good. Do we know what the movie is?”
He shakes his head. “They had it narrowed down to three options. One has a princess and singing animals, one’s a teenage girl band, and one’s a superhero movie.”
I bite my lip. “I’m not sure what to hope for.”
“I’m rooting for superheroes.”
The girls have disappeared upstairs, and I pause by his mantle, admiring the family photos stretching from one end to the other. There’s one of a young Tom beside another young girl with dark hair, both perched on the edge of a pool, laughing. Another photo is of a woman, her husband, and four kids ranging from their late teens to roughly Maya’s age. This must be Tom’s sister, Tracy, and her family. Maya spends weekends with her cousins about once a month, and I’ve heard a lot of tales that I’m relatively certain neither Tom nor Tracy are aware of. Nothing dangerous, of course, but nothing either of them would endorse.
There are lots of pictures of Maya at various ages – a tiny sleeping infant curled against Tom’s broad chest while he smiles proudly; a chubby-cheeked, tawny-complected toddler clad in nothing but a diaper, dragging a large stuffed bear while pointing at something outside the frame; Maya with Skyler, both of them five or six years old, with huge gap-toothed smiles, dressed in matching fluorescent pink bathing suits. There are also pictures of Maya and Skyler at a butterfly exhibit a couple of years ago, each with dozens of butterflies lining their outstretched arms.
Heaviness falls over me, compressing my chest. I’ll never have a daughter of my own. The reminder’s been hovering around the outer edges of my mind since Lila told me she and Tucker were trying to conceive.
It’s nothing new. You’ve known this for years. Let it go.
I force my attention back to the photos on the mantle. There’s a new one that’s been added since the last time I studied these. Maya’s dressed in a winter parka with a faux-fur-lined hood. Huge snowflakes dot the photo. Maya stands beside a tall, lithe beauty with flawless chestnut skin, golden topaz eyes, and the same copper-highlighted curls as Maya.
Her mom, Chele, supermodel and Tom’s ex-wife. Like Prince or Cher, she goes by a single name, and it's pronounced "shell"… and just like a seashell, she's beautiful on the outside, but empty where her heart should be.
I don’t have much use for Chele. I don’t give a crap about her money or success or fame. What I do care about is that she likes the title of motherhood far more than actually being a mother. Tom flies Maya to New York to see her mom two or three times a year. That’s their only interaction, because Chele refuses to come to Colorado. It’s apparently far too uncivilized here for her to grace Maya with her presence. She never calls, never emails, never sends birthday gifts, never remembers anything of significance. Despite that, just last year, she gave an interview in which she discussed the struggles of juggling motherhood with her career, giving the interviewer the impression she was a single mom, raising her daughter all alone.
Lila swears it wasn’t her, and given the pain it caused Maya, I believe her, but someone went on several online entertainment forums and “enlightened” the media to the actual role Chele plays in her daughter’s life. At that point, it became a scandal, and Chele’s agent blamed the interviewer for twisting her words and misrepresenting her. The whole thing turned into a debacle, and while Chele came out of it fine in the end, it hurt Maya deeply.
That’s why I don’t care for Chele. She has an amazing daughter, but she only wants her when it’s convenient. Meanwhile, my longing for an unscarred life with a loving husband and a houseful of kids and animals and chaos is unattainable, thanks to a bunch of assholes in the Afghan desert.
Tom, Maya, Skyler, and I spend the evening piled around his cozy living room, eating cheese-laden pizzas and salads. Tom ordered my favorite – Hawaiian – for the two of us to share, along with pepperoni for the girls. Tom is the only person I know who’ll eat Hawaiian pizza with me. He orders it whenever we have pizza after finding out that I love it but never order it because Tucker, Lila, and Mark hate it. The girls choose the teen pop group on stage in London for our evening entertainment. Maya and Skyler occasionally put down their food to sing or dance while Bella enthusiastically joins in, howling and bouncing excitedly. I smile at Tom, who shrugs.
“It could be worse.” We’re beside each other on the sofa. I’d grinned and caught his eye when I sat down, deliberately resting my leg against his. He’d smiled and nodded. “Impressive.”
I’ve been sitting that way for twenty minutes, and aside from an initial spiral of anxiety, I haven’t panicked once.
“It could definitely be worse,” I agree. “At least it’s only an hour and a half.”
When the concert finally ends, the girls go upstairs to Maya’s room. “Make sure you leave your bedroom door unlocked,” Tom calls after them. He gathers the dishes and I help him clean up. When we finish, he whistles for Bella. She scampers into the kitchen, skidding across the tiles. He glances over. “Want to sit outside? It’s supposed to be nice tonight.”
“Sure.” I follow him as he holds the door open for Bella, who dashes down the porch steps and into his fenced-in backyard. He grabs a blanket from a shelf by the back door, then sits on his top porch step. I sit next to him, gazing up at the twinkling stars caught in the quiet interlude between sunset and night. The mountain air is cool but not cold, and the breeze gently whispers through the trees. Neither of us speaks, content to enjoy the peace.
In the silence, I hear Willow’s voice in my head again. You trust Tom. You can choose to be vulnerable with him.
I’ve thought about it since my appointment. About telling Tom the dark, shameful truth about what happened in Afghanistan. About lowering the walls I use to keep people out. About inviting him deeper into my shitshow of a life.
I trust Tom, but the thought of exposing the whole truth of how screwed up I am terrifies me. I’ve erected my walls to protect myself from pain.
