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CHAPTER 5
“What do you want me to say, Owen. Sorry I wasn’t very friendly towards Dr. Riker. I was uncomfortable around her.”
“Friendly? Forget being very friendly, Cris, you were downright hostile.”
“I don’t like her, Owen. I don’t like how she looks at me, or that she writes shit with that fancy pen while she’s looking at me. It’s like she’s already judged and tried me. She hates me!”
“She doesn’t hate you.”
“Oh yeah she does. And if I had to guess a lot of it has to do with her feelings for you.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Owen gives me a quick side-glance, then faces forward once again as he drives us home.
“Have you not seen the way she looks at you? Her eyes soften and light up when they’re on you. I swear, she wants your bones.”
“Cris, she’s like sixty.”
“No, she’s definitely younger than that. And even then, women in their sixties still have fantasies, you know. I know I will!”
The words are silly, even to my own ears, and we both burst out in laughter. I turn to him as the deep rumble of his voice fills me with warmth. When he looks at me with that smile that I have loved for so long, I nearly melt.
Maybe we did get something out of this visit after all. Reliving the day we met was like a balm to my soul. Not that I’d ever stopped loving Owen, I never will, but today I fell in love with him all over again.
Unable to resist, I reach out and touch his cheek, run my fingers through his hair and around his ear. His smile falters a little. Without warning he turns right, into a small side street, and parks in front of an Animal Hospital.
He turns to me, worried. “Cris, I’m sorry about today. I thought maybe, if we laid everything out on table, it would help bring us closer. But it looks like it had the opposite effect. It wasn’t supposed to dredge up awful memories. All I wanted was to be sure there was nothing left that would create distance between us.”
“I know.” I feel awful for putting him through this. “We are closer. At least I think we are. I thought we’d gotten past all that anyway.”
“Yeah, sometimes if feels that way. But then when I really look, I can see there’s still something off. It doesn’t feel like we are us anymore. And it’s not that I’m not taking responsibility for my part in the deal. I am taking full blame. I want us back. All the way back.”
“I do, too. I want that, too. The thing is, I don’t think there’s anything left to put on the table. No, that’s wrong. I know there is more. We can sit and talk circles around it and always come up with more. But I don’t want to deal with it anymore. I want to heal and move on. With you. Can we just do that?”
He squeezes my thigh in reassurance. “Yeah, we can,” he says, reaching out and wiping at the moisture under my left eye.
When we arrive home, Katie and Mia race out to greet us. I suspect they were at the door anxiously awaiting our return.
My kid runs past my outstretched arms and straight to Owen. “Daddy!”
“Of course, chopped liver whenever Daddy’s around,” I grumble, but really it’s a sweet bond those two have, and my heart swells when I see him lift her into his arms.
Then my stomach drops as he throws her in the air and feet go over head when he flips her, and she squeals in delight even as I nearly faint.
“Owen!” I cry out to him. “You’re going to drop her one of these days!”
“Nah, kids love this. Don’t ya, love?” he asks her, tickling her round belly.
“Yeah! Again, again!” Mia begs.
I shake my head and walk away from them. “Better not to see,” I tell Katie as I pass her. She giggles and follows me in so I can pay her.
Katie, a college student that lives in our neighborhood, started working for me last month. She’s a sweet girl and so great with Mia. Recently I found a part-time position at Firth and Wells Bank. The shifts are short, but still, they go beyond Mia’s preschool hours.
After a lot of thought, and calculating, we realized it was worth the few hours I’d pay Katie for the “wrap-around care,” watching her Tuesdays and Thursdays 9-1:30 and Wednesdays a little longer since she picks her up from school. Though I do miss my little girl like crazy, I still get to spend most of the day with her, and I know she is having a blast with kids her age, and learning more than I could teach.
That evening is like any other. Playtime with Mia for Owen while I cook us dinner. We sit and have what my daughter has requested, mac n’ cheese pizza. It’s not my favorite, actually it’s a little hard to get past the idea, but both she and Owen gobble it up like it’s manna from heaven.
Much to her delight, we both put Mia to bed, each one of her parents taking a turn reading to her. Though it’s Owen in the end who stays to scratch her back and fully settle her.
