He hesitated. “We can talk about it after.”
“After the shower?”
“After the birth.”
I turned around, blinking at him. “All right, Sutter. Out with it.”
“With what?”
“Whatever’s been going on the past couple months that you’re not telling me.”
Vega rolled onto her side and groaned, as if to say “here we go.”
“It’s a sad story,” he said, sniffing as he peeked into a Tupperware of blue sugar cookies on the island. “A problem I don’t know how to fix, and trust me—it’ll only make you cry.”
“I won’t cry, I promise.” I tried to look serious, but the truth was, I routinely felt on the verge of tears. I turned to get a glass from a cupboard so he wouldn’t see me falter, and also because my mouth was minutes away from shriveling into a desert.
“If you insist.” As I opened the freezer, he checked through the doorway to ensure nobody was listening. “It was Cheryl.”
I paused while scooping ice into my glass. “From the adoption agency?”
“Yeah.”
“Why? They know we’re pregnant.”
“She and I have kept in touch the past couple months. She’d called back in March with this case—a boy she thought we could help with, and you wouldn’t believe this kid’s story . . .” He scratched his jaw, leaning on the island. “It hit a little close to home for me, so I asked her to keep me updated.”
“Close to home?” I could tell by the look on his face this was serious. I braced myself with a long drink of water. I would’ve considered pouring the rest over my head if I didn’t need to be presentable a little longer. I set down the glass, took a breath, and steadied myself against the island opposite him. “Okay. Who is he?”
“Nine-year-old boy who’s, as of a few months ago, an orphan.”
“Oh, poor baby,” I said, pressing my palm to my heart. “What happened to his parents?”
“His mom passed after he was born.”
“And his dad?”
“Dead. The boy killed him—”
“What?” I asked so sharply, Vega raised her head.
“Let me finish.” He tapped a finger on the island’s surface. “The kid shot his dad while protecting his eleven-year-old sister from what Cheryl said could’ve been a fatal beating.”
I dropped my jaw. Now I understood why it hit close to home. Manning, too, had intervened with his father to protect his sister. Unfortunately, it hadn’t resulted quite the same way. “I can’t believe that.”
“Apparently, the kid knew where his dad kept his gun and when push came to shove, he just . . . snapped.”
“He didn’t snap. He saved her.” Snapped was a word Manning used in reference to his dad’s temper. I knew that possibility scared him, in himself and in others, but this wasn’t the same. “And now the boy’s alone? What about the sister?”
“Relatives took her in. This is the worst part—they don’t want anything to do with him.”
The hair on my skin prickled. For the first time in recent history, sad news didn’t actually make me want to cry. It made my already warm face heat with a familiar sense of frustration for a boy who’d been wronged. A familiar sense of injustice. For the kid, and for my Manning, an innocent man who’d had enough experience being unfairly defined by his criminal past. “Wow,” I said, my heart racing. “Where is he now?”
“A group home, but Cheryl’s worried there are bad influences there.”
“How worried?” I asked.
He blew out a sigh. “Enough to call on a Sunday to see if I’d found anyone who could . . . help.”
“Help,” I repeated. “As in, adopt? Is that why she called us in the first place?”
“She knows my history with Madison and my dad, plus the fact that we’ve been rejected a few times.” He pushed off the island, straightening his back. “All that considered, I guess she thought we’d be a good fit for the boy.”
It was an eerily similar situation to what Manning had been through—and yet completely different. Manning had survived it the best he could’ve because of the family around him willing to help. I shook my head with disdain for the boy’s relatives. “What’d you tell Cheryl?”
“That we’re about to have a baby. That we’d never considered a kid that age. That we . . .” His jaw went taut. “It’s just not the right time.”
I didn’t realize I was rubbing my stomach until I noticed Manning tracking my hand. “Bad timing,” I murmured.
He went silent, staring at nothing on the ground. After a few seconds, he said, “I can’t help but think of my sister.”
Of course he couldn’t help it. It was the first place my mind had gone as well. It hurt him to say no, but how could we help? We were about to have our hands full. Could we even take care of a young boy who’d survived more by nine than most did in a lifetime?
Manning was that boy. He’d also seen, done, and lost more than one person should ever have to—all by the age of fifteen. I got the unsettling feeling that I’d been here before. Helpless to change the situation. Disappointed in people and the system. Scared for a boy’s future.
Only, I wasn’t helpless now. Not like I’d been at sixteen. “He defended his sister,” I said.
“I know. Caseworker said it doesn’t matter. His relatives are treating him like a murderer when he’d had no other choice.”
“Wouldn’t you have done the same? If you’d known what your dad was doing to Maddy?”
His biceps tensed, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallowed. I didn’t need to hear his answer. I already knew what it was.
“He killed a grown man, Lake. We’ll have a newborn in the house. Kids who go through trauma at that age can be fucked up.”
“They can also turn out pretty great,” I said with a look.
Manning’s knuckles whitened as he gripped the counter, as if he were restraining himself. He was a protector, and he was also a good man. A champion for the underdog. I had no doubt he wanted to help, even though there were more than enough reasons not to. “I can tell you’ve given this a lot of thought,” I said.
“A lot.” He ran a hand through his hair. “What if my aunt hadn’t been there to help? Or Henry? I would’ve either gone to juvie or a group home, and who knows where I’d be today.”
I nodded. “Fate really has been on our side all along, Manning. Some things can never be explained, like your sister’s death, but we’re lucky.” I placed my hands on my stomach as our son moved. Perhaps he was listening, throwing his opinion into the ring. “And the more we’ve fought, the stronger we’ve become. As individuals, and as a couple.”
Manning came around the island and put his hands next to mine. “He’s moving.”
I nodded. “We have our baby and everything else we could ever ask for. And God knows we asked.”
“Begged,” he said with a faint smile.
I watched his expression closely. Despite the blissful look he wore whenever he felt the baby kick, Manning seemed suddenly tired, too—almost beaten down—for the first time since we’d found out we were pregnant. I supposed this sadness was what he’d been hiding from me on his late-night walks with Vega. Other than fatherhood, I tried to remember the last time Manning had wanted something. The last time he’d even asked me for anything. Besides the house and his business, he rarely did anything for himself.
He glanced up and caught me staring at him. “Lake,” he said.
“What is it, Great Bear?” I asked. “Can’t read your mind. You want something, you have to ask for it.”
“It’s not fair to you.” He spread his fingers on my tummy, brushing the tips of my middle fingers. “The next few months—years—are going to be chaos for us.”
“But?”
“But I can’t help feeling I’m turning my back on this kid, when I understand exactly what he’s going through.”
I waited for Manning to ask. This couldn’t be for me—everything else he di
d, he did for me. Once the baby was born, Manning would be working overtime for both of us. If he wanted to adopt a nine-year-old boy, he had to say it aloud. He had to need it.
“What’s his name?” I asked.
“Mateo. Mateo Alvarado.”
“Mateo,” I repeated. I formed a picture of him in my mind, a skinny, dark-haired kid weighed down by a gun. “Have you met him?”
He shook his head, removing his hands to cross his forearms over his chest. “I sent some things to Cheryl—boys’ clothes and toiletries, that kind of stuff. He didn’t even have a second pair of shoes. It doesn’t feel like enough.”
“Would anything feel like enough?” I asked.
“Only the obvious.” He scrubbed his jaw, glancing out the window over the sink. He’d finished the stable long ago, but we’d shifted our focus right from dogs to babies and hadn’t talked about getting a horse in a long time. Too much to handle—and yet here we were, discussing a nine-year-old boy.
Nine was terribly young—Maddy’s age when she’d passed.
“What is it?” I prompted. “What’s the obvious solution?”
He turned back to me, his eyes narrowed in thought. He struggled with whatever was running through his mind. “I want to help. More than that,” he admitted. “I want to . . . meet him.”
Though I’d half-expected him to say it, it took my mind a moment to catch up. Manning and I could help financially from a distance. That meant there was really only one reason to meet Mateo. “And what if he’s a good kid? Like you were?” I asked. I tried to hide the emotion in my voice so Manning could make this decision on his own, but I suspected he saw through me. “What if he’s being punished for doing the right thing?”
He hesitated. “Then I’m not sure I can stand by and let it happen. If that means adoption, then I guess that’s what I want. Maybe it’s selfish of me to ask that of you with everything we have going on.”
I inhaled a deep breath. It was no small thing, what he was suggesting. I didn’t know the right response, if one even existed, but I couldn’t think of a time in recent history when Manning had been selfish. I’d tried to get him to be, actually, and he never was—which was how I knew this was important to him.
If I’d had the opportunity to save Manning years ago, either from his sister’s death or from his prison sentence, I wouldn’t have hesitated a moment. It was possible I wanted this, too—I wasn’t sure. But Manning had asked for it, and I at least owed him my support until we learned more.
He cinched his brows, watching me. “What are you thinking?”
I held his gaze a few moments, his brown eyes torn but full of love. I’d fought hard for that love, for a permanent spot next to him in the universe, and to complete our little triangle. But triangles weren’t the only shapes out there, not even in the sky. “I think we moved our stars, Manning,” I said. “Maybe now, we help rearrange someone else’s.”
Epilogue
A HOT SUMMER DAY, 2018
I waited on the back porch, Mads balanced on my hip, while Henry tied his shoes. He had a very particular method of looping his bunny ears and would not be rushed—my son took after his father that way. Once satisfied, he got up from his knee and took my hand even though we were only going across the yard.
“Okay, Mommy,” he said. “Let’s go.”
I took the kids down the steps and across the grass. Manning had opened all the doors and windows of his workshop, but neither he nor Mateo would’ve noticed a herd of elephants coming. Jimi Hendrix blared on the stereo, and Mateo played a hammer like an electric guitar while Manning sanded down a bedframe.
I whistled and waved until I got Manning’s attention. He shut off the sander and lowered the volume before pushing his goggles onto his head.
As soon as Madison spotted her daddy, she reached for him, practically vaulting out my arms. “She loves you more than me,” I complained as he came over and took her from me.
“What can I say?” He bounced her to “Foxey Lady” and brushed her messy black curls from her face. “I have a way with the ladies.”
I rolled my eyes. “It’s fine,” I said, bending down to squeeze Henry in a hug from behind. “Because this one’s a momma’s boy, aren’t you, sweetheart?”
“Yes, Mom,” he said as if I’d asked him to take out the trash. Henry was my serious little man—he looked just like Manning and acted as if he carried the world on his shoulders. I’d planned to call him Chuckie, the name my dad had gone by as a kid, but Henry had come out of the womb quiet and frowning, and I knew—he was not a Chuckie. Henry Charles Sutter it was, and even though my baby didn’t cry on the day of his birth, both his godfather and grandfather had sure as hell shed tears of joy.
Mateo shuffled out of the workshop, cleaning his hands on a rag. At fourteen, he was taller, and almost skinnier, than me. “Since you’re home today, are you making us lunch?” he asked.
“Hey.” Manning nodded at him. “She’s not your personal chef.”
“Aren’t I, though?” I asked. Nothing made me happier than feeding my family, and Manning knew it, but ever since we’d gone from the two of us to having young boys in the house, Manning had been even more of a stickler about showing me respect. No son of his would treat his woman as anything less than a queen.
“Sorry,” Mateo said, bopping Mads on the nose as she giggled and tried to grab his finger.
“Actually, I am about to make lunch,” I said. “We came out to take orders.”
Manning removed the goggles on his head, tossing them on the nearest work table. “You even have to ask?”
“Two monster sandwiches?” I guessed.
Mateo nodded emphatically. “Yes, please. But you better make Dad one, too.”
Manning eyed him. “I’ve taught you too well.”
“I take it you boys are hungry?” I teased.
“Starved.” Manning winked. “Why are you home today anyway?”
It was a fair question. I didn’t normally close the practice for no apparent reason, but a small part of me had hoped Manning would puzzle the pieces together and remember today’s anniversary. We’d recognized it on and off over the years, but twenty-five years since the day we’d met seemed like a day to be home with him. “I just felt like having a family day,” I said.
“That’s it?” Mateo asked.
“Well . . .” As I debated whether to remind Manning, he set down Mads.
“Oh, almost forgot,” he said, reaching into his back pocket to pull out his red bandana.
I broke into a smile. He hadn’t forgotten after all. “I can’t believe you still have that thing.”
“Same one,” he said, knotting the bandana at the back of his head. “Did I ever tell you kids about the day I met your mom?”
Henry, standing in front of my legs, nodded. “Tell us again.”
Mateo hoisted himself onto the work table. “It was a hot summer day,” he began.
“She made me a killer sandwich,” Manning said, ruffling Henry’s hair, “and I was instantly in love.”
“It didn’t go quite that smoothly.” I lowered my voice into storytelling mode and made tickle-monster hands at Mads as she sucked her thumb and hung onto her dad’s leg. “We came up against some obstacles,” I said.
Henry fixed his hair. “What’s an obstacle?”
“Something in the way,” Manning said.
“Or in our case,” I said, glancing at Manning, “someone.”
“The evil stepsister.” Manning laughed at his joke, but I didn’t. That was a real blemish on my fairytale if you asked me. Noticing my glare, his expression cleared. “Since I couldn’t confess my feelings to your mom, who, by the way, was and still is extremely beautiful,” Manning continued, “I told her the story of Altair and Vega.”
“Summer Triangle,” the boys said in unison.
“That’s right.” Manning pointed up at the sky, despite the fact that it was eighty degrees with clear blue skies. “And I made her a promise on the s
tars.” Manning looked at me with his chocolatey brown eyes. “Remember?”
“No matter what, the story would only ever be about us,” I said, puckering my lips at him with a loud smooch.
“Daddy kiss,” Madison said, pulling on Manning’s pant leg. He picked her up, pecking her pink cheeks all over.
Hearing their names, Altair and Vega had wandered from their usual grassy spots in the sun. Behind them followed the newest addition to our family. Blue had passed earlier in the year, and because I’d decided my life needed to have no less than three dogs or children, we’d adopted when I’d eventually felt ready.
In honor of Blue, who’d shared my eye color, Cola—a Saint Bernard Madison tried to ride on a daily basis—had been named for Manning and Henry’s soda-pop brown eyes.
Not that she needed a makeshift pony. Her father had spoiled her with a horse for her second birthday, which gave me plenty of time to get used to the idea before she was ready to ride.
As Cola settled under Mateo’s feet, I leaned against the table with him. It’d taken years before he’d started calling us Mom and Dad. In fact, from ages nine to twelve, Mateo had barely spoken beyond what was necessary. Manning had been the best kind of guardian for him—firm, honest, yet sensitive considering he and Mateo had experienced the same kind of pain—and Mateo had responded well. He’d been polite and helpful around the house, but it hadn’t been until Manning had brought him out into the workshop that Mateo had begun to blossom. I’d been hesitant about him handling tools at his age, but Manning had assured me working with his hands had gotten him through some of his worst times.
Now, not only was Mateo growing into his limbs, but his personality, too. He liked all kinds of music—even Manning’s “oldies” when he and his friends weren’t listening to rap—and was learning to play electric guitar. He’d also signed up to be a counselor with Young Cubs thanks to Gary, who’d had a lot of experience with adopted kids at the Y and had treated Mateo as a nephew since the day he’d met him.
I’d worried not all relationships would form as easily. My white, conservative father’s reaction to adoption in general had been a big concern, especially considering Mateo had come to us with a lot of issues and from a background similar to Manning’s. But any reservations had flown out the window the moment I’d shared Mateo’s test scores with my dad.
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