Uncomplicated Choices

by Cara Dee

  Jesse didn’t belong in LA, something I'd told him many times. Much like me, he thrived when he was around family.

  "We don't know yet," Madigan replied. "He's partying a lot, though. Drinking heavily."

  Aw, man. We had to do something if it was getting out of control.

  "So next time he's home to visit, we don't let him leave." I liked my suggestion.

  So did Madigan. "That’s what I told Lincoln. Jesse doesn’t stand a chance."

  That was reassuring. We could be a force to be reckoned with.

  *

  When everyone left around three, I continued almost frenetically. No one was around to distract me, meaning every thought was occupied by Ellis if I rested more than a minute. The couch was pushed into the living room, a new rug and coffee table were put into place, and the entertainment center was reassembled before I ordered Chinese for dinner. And I could eat at the same time as I sorted through all the DVDs and picture frames.

  I focused less on Ellis's feelings and decisions and more on my own. It'd been an intense few weeks—not only the time we spent on the yacht—but the days leading up to it. The physical aspect was a nonissue; my attraction for him had probably always been there in a removed, distant sort of way. The rest, though? Fuck me, it was messing with my head.

  We'd known each other for six years now, and every goddamn story, every anecdote, was changing. Everything I knew, my brain was trying to reexamine, and I didn’t even know why. Because my feelings toward had him had changed? Maybe.

  I sighed and wiped sweat off my neck, noticing I'd stopped what I was doing. Damn that man for getting under my skin.

  On the other hand, I wanted more. There was something intoxicating about having your heart in someone else's hands. Perhaps he didn’t have a full grasp on all of it yet, but it was no doubt heading in that direction.

  Get back to work, you sappy fool.

  Grabbing a bottle of water from the otherwise pathetically empty fridge, I surveyed the kitchen, then the living room, and deemed the downstairs almost ready. A final touch of some knickknacks and setting up the surround sound system could be dealt with tomorrow.

  Then I continued upstairs.

  Haley was a priority, so I got cracking in her room. The polka-dotted walls were perfect, pastel pink and white, and the bed looked comfy under a canopy of multicolored drapes and string lights. Next were her clothes and toys, though she was old enough to organize some of her stuff the way she wanted it. I put together the shelving system and emptied the moving boxes in the nicer plastic ones that went on the shelves, and we could do the rest together.

  *

  I spent much of the next day in the fast lane of domesticity, too. I finished with the house, went grocery shopping, did some paperwork, didn’t think about Ellis more than a few hundred times, and then prepared dinner. I had a feeling the girls were gonna be as exhausted as they'd be starving, so I wanted everything ready when we got back.

  After that, there wasn’t much to do, yet I had to keep moving. Otherwise, it would be too easy to have a seat in the kitchen and stare at my phone.

  He's not gonna call anytime soon.

  "Quit fucking obsessing." I smacked the wall in my shower, accidentally getting suds in my eye. "Serves you right, you neurotic asshole."

  I stepped under the spray and washed off. Then autopilot took over while I shaved and got dressed, and I reasoned with myself for once. Ellis was a good man. He would never intentionally hurt me, so I had to stop believing the worst. Lastly, he wasn’t gonna pay for what'd happened in my previous relationships.

  There. I could be rational.

  Then I was on my way to Seattle with a piece of cardboard that said "Can I have my daughter back now?"

  *

  As soon as I spotted Haley, my eyes smarted and I held up the sign. Lincoln was carrying her, and it was obvious she was looking for me in the sea of arrivals. Adeline walked hand in hand with Lyn and grinned tiredly when seeing my board. She leaned closer to Lincoln and Haley, pointing them in my direction, and then my girl wanted down. Fast. Her eyes widened, and this huge smile took over that I matched.

  "Daddy!"

  I picked up the pace as my heart did the same, not stopping until I was a few feet away from her. That was when I dipped down and grabbed her in my arms. I had no clue where the sign landed. It didn’t fucking matter. Haley was finally home again, and it felt too damn good. My throat closed up and words eluded me.

  Being a parent meant I was indestructible and a sitting duck all at once. Never had I felt this strong yet vulnerable at the same time. Ten feet tall, yet on my knees. I all but crushed her in my hug and peppered her face with kisses, and she giggled breathlessly.

  Eventually, I had to ease up on the hold, and then we were just kind of staring at each other with big grins.

  "I missed you." I swallowed hard and tucked a piece of hair behind her ear.

  "I missed you, too!" A yawn cut her excitement short, and I chuckled at her as she rubbed her eyes with her fists. "Can we go home now? I'm hungry." She tugged at my beanie.

  "Hell yeah, we can go home. Spaghetti and meatballs are waiting for us. And way too much ketchup."

  "Yes!" She fist-pumped the air.

  I spared Adeline and Lincoln quick hugs before I got down on one knee in front of Lyn. She got a better hug, and we exchanged an Eskimo kiss. She was thrilled about our plans for the week, which included fort-building, cookie-making, and Netflix-bingeing.

  "I feel dismissed," Lincoln said.

  Adeline laughed. "I think we're officially in the chopped liver category."

  "You're not wrong," I told her and stood up. "Where's the luggage?" 'Cause I was ready to hit the road.

  "Should be here soon." Lincoln glanced over his shoulder. Go figure, he couldn’t be bothered to handle his own luggage. "Anyway." He faced me again. "Ade said you haven't called the sitter."

  I shook my head. "I won't need her." A woman Adeline used to work with had recommended her daughter to watch the girls when our schedules clashed, but I wasn’t meeting with any clients this week. "I'll be in the warehouse setting up the new office. Haley and Lyn can tag along." There was a couch and a laptop with movies waiting to be watched. Possibly more than a little ice cream, too.

  Ade smiled and slipped her hand into Lincoln's. "Casey's gonna overdose on the princesses."

  Fingers crossed.

  Starting with spaghetti and meatballs while catching up.

  *

  Haley was so overwhelmed by her new room that once she was done squealing behind her hands, it got to be too much and she started crying. Flying halfway across the world probably hadn't helped.

  "Do you like it?" I sat down on her bed in the corner, and she nodded and ran over to me. "What do you think, Lyn?"

  While Haley climbed up on my lap and tried to hide her face in my armpit—which, frankly, I wouldn’t recommend—Lyn was inspecting every surface more critically. Pausing in front of the window, she looked out over our little backyard.

  Then she turned to me with a big smile. "This is so pretty, Uncle Casey."

  Phew. It passed inspection.

  Haley calmed down after a couple minutes, so I left them alone to explore while I heated up dinner. It was a good time to start a load of laundry too, 'cause Haley left with one piece of luggage and came home with two.

  With the food in the oven—with a shit-ton of cheese dumped on top—I took the girls' suitcases to the laundry room and sorted out all the clothes. I smiled, hearing them stomping around upstairs.

  Fuck, it felt good having Haley home again.

  *

  We didn’t get much done the first three days. Haley and Lyn went from cranky to hyper while they readjusted to our time zone. Getting them to sleep on time was fucking impossible, but at least I got plenty of cuddles.

  The weather today was…okay, so I decided to put the girls to use. It was never too early to learn how to pick weeds, and they could do that while I gav
e the picket fence a fresh coat of white paint.

  Keith stopped by to catch up and have coffee, too.

  Everything was fine on the surface. Being around the girls and talking to Keith was always nice, yet I couldn’t shake the deep-rooted yearning Ellis had reawakened in me. I missed him.

  Standing up, I used my arm to wipe sweat off my forehead, and I looked at the sky. With a bit of luck, the paint would tack up before it started raining.

  A sleek black sedan drove onto the quiet street, and fuck me if I didn’t recognize it. My first thought went straight to Ellis, and just as quickly, I dismissed it. It was his goddamn wife. Marilyn came to family dinners only on holidays, and if she arrived from work, that was the car she drove.

  "This can't be good," I muttered under my breath. Thankfully, I could be quick on my feet sometimes, and I addressed Haley and Lyn. "Girls, why don't you show Pop-Pop Haley's new room? I bet he'll love the glow-in-the-dark stars you bought at Disney."

  I hadn't loved attaching them to the ceiling, but that was another story.

  "You gotta see them!" Lyn exclaimed, immediately grabbing Keith's hand.

  "All right, all right." He grunted through a chuckle and rose from the lawn chair.

  Haley darted up the small porch and ripped the door open.

  Privacy: accomplished.

  Marilyn parked in front of my house, grabbed her purse, and stepped out. How much did she know? Given the circumstances, it wasn’t a matter of if she knew. I must've been the topic of at least one conversation for her to even know my new address. Which posed another question. Was Ellis aware of her being here?

  She looked like the bearer of shitty news. Considering she worked in her family-owned funeral home, I supposed it was fitting. She wore a lot of black, and her hair and makeup were always impeccable. She was attractive—I couldn’t deny that—though the frigidness to her made me instinctively want to take a step back.

  "Casey." There was no warmth to her voice, either.

  "Hey, Marilyn." I adjusted my beanie.

  "Can we talk?" she asked curtly.

  "Well, I…" Fuck. "I can't think of any reason why we can't." And that sucked. "What's up?"

  She rested her purse at the top of the fence, and I pressed my lips together. Telling her it was newly painted wouldn’t earn me any favors.

  "I saw Keith and the children heading in, so I won't ask to be invited." How nice of her. "I, uh, I had an interesting conversation with my husband yesterday."

  Fuck you.

  Shit. Maybe I had some resentment toward her building up inside me. Probably a lot of jealousy, too. So fuck her. Fuck her forever and a day for the fortune of being able to call Ellis her husband.

  He's divorcing her. Calm your tits.

  I folded my arms over my chest, waiting. I wasn’t gonna ask.

  She cleared her throat. "Perhaps it's best I show you." Opening her bag, she dug out a—oh, fuck. A camera. "I found this in his bag when he stopped by to do laundry. I was only going to check the battery when the last taken image popped up on the screen."

  I didn’t need to see it, but there it was. Ellis flashing a soft, brief smile as he pressed a light kiss to the spot above the waistband of my sweats. It tugged at my heart painfully to see it now.

  "Ellis told me things have changed," she went on. "He wants a divorce."

  Why did I sense a "but" coming? I didn’t dare to hope, except I held my breath as if the answer I wanted would make my year. Goddamn, I hoped. I hoped against hope.

  "I'm going to be honest with you, Casey." She took a breath and stashed away the camera again. "Those words didn’t hurt as much as they should, and maybe he's right. Maybe we're not right for each other. I can't argue when push comes to shove, but—" There it fucking was, and her steely façade was crumbling. Marilyn was uncomfortable. "He doesn't have the whole story. He doesn’t know yet that I'm pregnant."

  "Jesus." Nausea rose within me, and I rubbed a hand over my mouth. Babies were great news, babies were wonderful news, babies were fucking awesome—right? Yeah. It was purely self-centered of me to hate this moment with every fiber of my being.

  He'll never choose me now.

  The brick of guilt hit me instantly, and I did everything I could to push away the selfish fears.

  "I'm telling him tonight." Marilyn squared her shoulders. "My hope is that he and I will do this together without…distractions, if you will, from other directions." Oh, that bitch. My jaw tensed. "The question is, can you back off and give Ellis and me space—"

  "You're not serious," I blurted out. "You wanna see me as a distraction? Be my fucking guest—but you're not gonna speak on Ellis's behalf to me. I'll respect his wishes, all right? And, for the record—" I gestured between us "—I don't think he's gonna be too pleased about you going behind his back to discuss this with me before you breathe a word of it to him—you know, the father of your child. If you don't want me to be part of this, then don't fucking include me."

  She looked stricken from my vent at first, though her cold mask was soon firmly in place. "I see." Her mouth thinned. "I guess I was foolish, hoping you'd be rational enough to realize he might not see clearly—"

  I cut her off again, this time genuinely angry. "Do you hear yourself? It's insulting as fuck. You're basically saying we need to make a decision for him because he might not be able to do it himself." I pointed to her car. "I won't be part of some manipulation game, so you can leave. If or when Ellis reaches out to me, I'll be as honest as I've always been."

  Marilyn abruptly gathered her bag, then turned on her heel and got in her car.

  I waited for the relief at her leaving to hit me, but it didn’t come. The anger simmered below the surface, and my stomach was in knots. The only silver lining I could see was the fact that it was as easy as breathing to redirect my focus to Ellis. It was about him now, not me. Marilyn could go fuck herself for all I cared, but I'd do everything to make this easier for Ellis.

  *

  I couldn’t pretend to be in a good mood, so I got started on dinner rather than to seek out Keith and the girls. There might be another girl joining us soon. How would birthday parties look? Would Ellis and Marilyn show up as a family with their child?

  All kinds of shit went through my head, and I'd burn dinner if I tried to do anything complicated. We had leftover barbecue chicken in the freezer that I'd originally packed as work lunches. While I defrosted that, I prepared fries and a spinach dip. Greens—couldn’t forget the greens. Opening the fridge, I stared unseeingly at the container holding our vegetables.

  Salad, salad, salad…

  Ellis had made a good salad that day I made the bourbon chicken. He's gonna be a dad. As heavy as the rock was in my gut, I couldn’t help but smile a little. He'd make an awesome father, no matter the nature of the relationship he had with Marilyn.

  Grabbing a few random vegetables, I put it all on the cutting board on the kitchen island and began chopping. Funny how good I was at chopping shit when I was anxious and upset.

  Maybe I needed to divert my attention to anything but the baby news, and what the crap would that be? I hadn't blogged properly since before my trip. If I sat down now and let it all pour out, it would be ugly. Not to mention it would be way more than I was comfortable sharing with complete strangers on the internet.

  I glanced at my phone on the counter, thinking perhaps I should meet up with some friends. Though, the thought held zero appeal, and I had Haley and Lyn another couple days. This weekend, however. I'd need to do something.

  "Jesus Christ." I sighed and set down the knife. One tiny person could cure my overthinking for the moment; that was a start. "Haley! Come down here and remind Daddy that babies are good news!"

  Chapter 15

  I was in the middle of a dream about rock samples when the phone rang. Rubbing sleep out of my eyes, I uttered a "huh," because it was a pretty good idea. There was enough space at work to set up a showroom where clients could see samples of all kinds o
f things. Types of rock for pathways, photos from my portfolio on the walls, types of wood, soil, grass, and—the phone rang again.

  With a grunt, I reached for the offending object and spotted Ellis's name on the display. My stomach flipped as I answered. "Ellis, are you okay?" I didn’t see any other reason for him to call at three in the morning.

  "I…yeah. Hey."

  "Hey." I sat up and rubbed at my face. "How are you?"

  "Can…can we talk?" Oh hell, he was drunk. "I'm outside."

  Shit. "I'll be right down." Disconnecting the call, I jumped into action and got out of bed. Something was definitely wrong if he was here in the middle of the night. As I stepped into a pair of pajama bottoms, the phone rang again, and I answered on my way down the stairs. "Yeah?"

  "I forgot to say—I'm sorry I woke you up."

  I snorted and pocketed my phone.

  Once I was in the hallway, I unlocked and opened the door, and I'd been right. He wasn’t okay at all. If his unkempt hair and the shadows under his eyes didn't speak volumes, his rumpled clothes and growing scruff did. At this point, it was long enough to be a beard, and fuck it all if he still didn’t make it look sexy as sin.

  He held up a pop and a half-eaten burger. "Mind if we sit out here? I don't—don't want to wake up Haley and Lyn."

  Solid idea. The fresh air would do him good, too. I snatched a hoodie from the knobs on the coat closet door, then exited the house quietly. It was a muggy night; the hoodie might not even be necessary.

  Ellis stumbled slightly and set the two lawn chairs next to each other. Not much else would fit on the porch.

  Wait.

  "Hey, what—" I stepped forward, frowning. There was something… I'd caught a glimpse of his knuckles, and did they look bruised? "Ellis, what the fuck?" I inspected his hand. Two of his knuckles had recently been banged up.