by Mia Ford
“Yeah, you did,” Georgia says simply.
“I’m sorry,” I sigh.
“Why?” Georgia counters. “Come on, Ethan, we’re both adults, you know. Last time, we were both really young. And pretty stupid. This time we’re a lot older. We can handle this.”
I frown. Why is she being so blasé about this? Regardless of anything else, I got drunk and took advantage of her.
“Stop that,” Georgia says, and I start. She rolls her eyes. “I can almost see what you’re thinking. Look, you might have been drunk, but you definitely didn’t take advantage of me, alright? I participated in that, too. I could have pushed you away and I didn’t. You definitely didn’t coerce me into anything.”
Actually…she’s right. She threw herself just as eagerly into having sex as I did.
“Why…?” I ask, confused.
“It’s been a long time,” she says with a shrug. “I guess, like you, I just let lust take over. It happened, we can’t take it back, so let’s just forget about it.”
“I still feel bad,” I say. “And I don’t want this to get awkward.”
“Then don’t let it be awkward,” Georgia says, rolling her eyes at me. I’m still confused by how blunt she’s being. But it also settles some of the fear I felt about having finally driven her away after last night. “Look, you and I have been friends for a long time, Ethan. A bit of sex isn’t going to kill that friendship.”
I snort.
“When you put it that way,” I say. “I guess you’re right.”
“Exactly,” Georgia says with a nod. “I’m not going to let things be awkward between us, and neither are you, okay? As I said, it happened. We can just pretend it didn’t.” She winks at me. “Unless you want to keep remembering it. Good dream material?”
I burst out laughing. It’s a little hysterical, though, because it covers the very sudden and unwelcome flash of lust that went through me at her joke. What the hell is that?
“Thanks, Georgia,” I say, grinning at her. “You’re right, I’m just being stupid. We can forget all about it and concentrate on other things, like Polly coming tomorrow.”
“Now you’re talking sense,” Georgia laughs. “So, just drop it. And go make us more coffee so we can plan.”
It occurs to me, as I get up to go to the kitchen, jokingly saluting my friend, that Georgia is awfully quick to cut the conversation off, as though she doesn’t want to talk too much about it. Though, I guess I can’t blame her.
After the odd reaction I had, as well as the flashes of memory that won’t leave my mind, I don’t really want to concentrate too much on what happened, either. Georgia is far too important to me, after all, to ruin this with odd feelings and uncontrollable lust.
Chapter Ten
Ethan
“I’m sorry for the late notice,” I apologize into the phone. “A lot happened over the weekend.”
“It’s fine,” my boss, Greg Hayward, says instantly. “I completely understand. We all know your situation. Is it just for today?”
“Just today,” I assure him. “I’ll be back at work first thing tomorrow. I can put in some overtime to make up for it, if you want.”
“Nah, don’t bother,” Greg says. He laughs. “If you do overtime, it means I have to do overtime too. We’ll just call this a sick day. We can deal without you for a day.”
“Thanks, Greg,” I say. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Good luck.”
I hang up the phone and sigh. At least my boss is understanding. I meant to call him yesterday but, when I went to do so, it completely slipped my mind when I finally looked at the message waiting for me. It was from Kyle, asking me if I was running late for painting, something I had completely forgotten about after everything else. I’d sent him a message back, apologizing and saying something had come up and I’d explain later.
Now it’s Monday. I’ve got the day off work, Georgia got the day off from her boss too, though she refused to say what she told him to swing that, and now I’m just waiting for both her and Polly to arrive. Which, of course, won’t be for another few hours, because it’s seven o’clock in the morning and Lily is only now stirring to get ready for school.
I tried my hardest to sleep last night. But I couldn’t close my eyes, no matter what I did. The thought that Polly would arrive here, in the home that I had built with Lily on my own after she left, kept spinning around my head. My mouth had been so dry and that I ended up taking a bottle of water to bed and getting up several times to refill it. Finally, at around two in the morning, I fell into an uneasy sleep, only to wake up around twenty minutes ago, remembering that I hadn’t yet told my boss I needed the day off work. Thank god that Greg is understanding.
There’s no point staying in bed, so I get dressed and wander toward the kitchen, knocking on Lily’s door on the way to make sure she’s getting up, and not curling up to go back to sleep.
“I’m up,” she calls sleepily.
“Don’t fall asleep,” I warn. “Or you’ll be going to school in your pajamas.”
“Okay.”
When I get to the kitchen, I flick the kettle on. Then I look around. I try to imagine Polly being here, sitting at my table and drinking from my cups. But I just can’t imagine it at all. There’s no way she should be here.
Damn, already off to a bad start.
Lily wanders into the kitchen, yawning. She’s tied a ribbon in her hair, but poorly, so I roll my eyes and go over to redo her ponytail, making her beam at me. I had to fast become a master of doing a little girl’s hair many years ago. I’m proud to say that I went from sloppy ponytails to braids, buns and, on occasion, pigtails.
“Morning, Dad,” she says.
“Good morning,” I say. “What do you want for breakfast?”
“I’ll have cereal,” she responds, heading over to the cupboard. Then she pauses, frowning at me. “Are you staying home?”
“Why do you ask?” I’m startled by her question.
“You’re not in work clothes,” she points out.
I look down at my attire. Normally, when I got to work, I go in flannel or polo shirts, heavy boots and thick pants. Today, though, I’m wearing a button-up shirt and a pair of jeans. Definitely not work attire.
“I have an important meeting today,” I say. I hesitate then sigh. I don’t want to keep secrets from Lily. “With your mother. We decided we needed to talk before she meets you.”
“Really?” Lily asks, stars in her eyes.
I wonder what she’s thinking. I really hope she’s not entertaining any ideas about her mother and I ever getting back together. She’ll be sorely disappointed, if she is. Thankfully, this is something I can nip in the bud straight away, as hard as it will be.
“There’s something you need to know about your mom, Lily,” I say gently. “She got married again three years ago. So, at some point, she might want you to meet her husband.”
Lily’s face falls It seems there was part of her that hoped Polly and I could work things out. Lily has wanted a mother for a very long time; she often teases me about finding one for her, but I can hear the desperate hope under the jokes. For her, Polly returning is likely a dream come true; it’s an easy solution to the problem.
But, unfortunately, life doesn’t work that way. Polly is married and, even if she wasn’t, it was never something that would happen. Lily, young as she is, and sheltered from the worst aspects of Polly’s abandonment, probably doesn’t quite understand that I’ll never forgive or trust my ex-wife again. And that, even if we can have an amicable relationship, it’ll never go beyond casual acquaintances.
But that’s far too much to try and ask a ten-year-old to comprehend, intelligent as she is. For now, I’ll dash her dreams so that she doesn’t get hurt next week when she sees Polly’s ring, or sometime in the future when Polly will inevitably ask for Lily to meet her husband.
“Oh,” Lily says in a small voice. “I see.”
I sigh and kneel down, opening
my arms. Lily rushes into them, clinging to my shirt, but I don’t care that it’s getting wrinkled.
“Sorry, Lils,” I say into her hair. “But, hey, it’s pretty cool that you’ll get to meet your mom anyway, right? It’s been a long time since I’ve seen her, too, so we can both get to know her.”
“Yeah,” Lily says in a wobbly voice. “I just wanted…”
Lily wants a mother so very badly. A mother who will live with us and help us look after the house and love us both. Polly, who is married and will only visit occasionally, won’t be enough, even though she’s Lily’s mother by blood. Even Georgia isn’t quite enough, because she, too, goes home at the end of the day, though she’s certainly closer to the role than Polly is.
“We’ll get there,” I promise my daughter, closing my eyes with a soft sigh.
Though…I’m not sure if that’s a promise I can keep. I’ve spent ten years hiding away from getting my heart broken once more. I’m not certain I can open those doors again.
And then, abruptly, Georgia’s face flashes into my mind.
My eyes pop open. Wait, what? I shake my head. My mind is playing tricks on me after Saturday night, that’s all. I let go of Lily and nudge her toward the cupboard.
“Eat your breakfast or you’re going to be late,” I say.
Lily smiles at me and turns away. I pull myself to my feet. The hardest thing about all this, I know, is that Lily is involved. Maybe I should have kept Polly and Lily apart until I knew what was going on. But I’ve made it a policy not to lie to my daughter. I couldn’t just pretend that this didn’t happen. She has the right to know that her mother is around, especially with how she’s been asking about her lately.
I just hope that Lily isn’t the one to get her heart broken this time.
When twelve-thirty rolls around, Georgia shows up, a full half hour before Polly is due.
“I did some research on the area code Polly put on her number,” she says when she walks in, making me look up.
“Hello to you too,” I say pointedly.
“Yeah, yeah, hello and all that,” Georgia says, grinning. “Anyway, the area code is from the Newark and New Jersey areas. So she lives about eighty to ninety miles away from here.”
“That’s a fair distance,” I say, trying to remember. “About an hour away, right?”
“Approximately an hour and a half, depending on where exactly she lives,” Georgia corrects. “Also, I looked into the last name Sanders. It’s really common.”
“Thanks for that,” I say, deadpan.
“But,” Georgia stresses, glaring at me. “There’s actually a local councilor in the Newark area with the last name Sanders. I looked him up, just in case, and found a few articles on him. There’s a few with his wife…Polly Sanders.”
“Wait…seriously?” I gasp.
Georgia hands me her phone with a picture on it. It’s in color, so Georgia likely copied it from a website. The politician, Warrick Sanders, looks like he’s around forty-something, and he has the same distant smile most politicians have. He’s waving to a crowd of people who are gathered nearby. At his side is a tall blonde woman with striking green eyes and a pleasant smile on her face as she threads her arm through her husband’s.
It’s been ten years, and she looks older than my memories paint her. But I still recognize my ex-wife.
“Whoa,” I say, sitting back, stunned.
“Hasn’t changed a bit, has she?” Georgia comments, taking her phone back. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah…yeah, I’m fine,” I say, shaking my head. “It’s just really fucking surreal, you know?”
“A little,” Georgia agrees. “To think, she lives fairly close, all things considered, and she’s married to a politician… I guess we don’t pay enough attention to the news since we never saw her and her husband doing their campaigns.”
“I’ve got too much on my plate to trawl news sites,” I groan.
“True,” Georgia says. Her eyes flash. “Which reminds me…at some point, we will be talking about this loan you think you’re applying for.”
I look at her, startled. How the hell does she know about that? Then, abruptly, the answer comes to me. I told her myself last night when she came in to find me drinking.
“Right,” I sigh. “Later. I can only handle one thing at a time.”
Georgia’s face softens. “Well, I do want to apologize, before anything else. I heard Lily ask you for that computer…but I didn’t think to ask how you felt about it. I knew you couldn’t afford it and just put the issue aside. Sorry.”
“It’s not your fault,” I said instantly, shaking my head. “You don’t have to consider those kinds of things, you know. Just concentrate on your stuff.” I give her a small smile. “Stop trying to take my worries on your shoulders. It isn’t fair for you.”
Georgia looks startled. I vaguely remember saying something similar to her on Saturday night. But, in case I didn’t, I want to say it now. I’m grateful that Georgia is trying to make things easier on me. But I need to be able to handle my own worries. And she needs to stop taking on that burden, otherwise she’ll never be happy.
Georgia opens her mouth to reply. Before she can, however, a knock sounds at my door.
And, instantly, panic explodes. I was doing really well until right at that moment. I glance at the clock and my shoulders tense.
“She’s ten minutes early!” I hiss.
“Okay, breathe, Ethan,” Georgia says. “Do you want me to open the door?”
Yes. I’d also like her to let me curl up in my bedroom while she conducts the meeting with Polly for me. But that can’t happen. I take in two very deep breaths and stand, trying to control the trembling in my hands.
I don’t want to do this.
“No, I need to,” I say.
I lift my chin and walk to the door. It feels oddly far, as though my tiny house suddenly got a lot bigger. I can see a shadow through the frosted windows next to the door, and I draw in another deep, calming breath before pulling the door open.
Then, there she is.
As soon as I open the door, Polly smiles hesitantly at me. The nervous look on her face is nothing like the calm, confident woman I saw on the photo Georgia showed me. The clothes she’s wearing are clean and expensive-looking, as are the diamonds at her throat and on her ears, and she’s fiddling with a shiny purse. But, otherwise, it feels like I’ve gone back in time ten years.
“Hello, Ethan,” she says.
“Polly,” I respond, and I congratulate myself for keeping my voice calm and even, despite feeling anything but. “Come in.”
I step aside and allow her into my house. I see her looking around, as well as the slight curl of her lip that says she finds my home lacking. I stiffen defensively; I do the best that I can. But she says nothing and I lead the way to the kitchen.
When we get there, however, Polly stops short.
“What is she doing here?” Polly demands.
Right, Georgia warned me about this. She said Polly would not like her being here. Georgia looks up from where she’s setting up three mugs.
“Coffee?” She asks pleasantly, but there’s a dangerous glint in her eye.
“Yes, please,” I say.
Polly narrows her eyes.
“I assumed that this was a meeting between you and I, Ethan,” she says.
“It is,” I affirm. “Georgia is here for support.”
“Support?” Polly asks incredulously. It’s almost funny, seeing the way her nostrils flare and a high, red flush appears on her cheeks. This is the way she used to look when she was angry back then, too. “Why the hell do you need support?”
“I don’t know, maybe because he’s meeting his ex-wife, who disappeared on him and was too much of a coward to ask him in person for a divorce, abandoning both him and her baby girl?” Georgia pipes up cheerfully from the kitchen.
The air abruptly drains out of the room. I close my eyes. When I asked Georgia to be here for support
, I didn’t mean for her to incite Polly on my behalf.
Though, to be fair, she did warn me that there might be a fight between the two of them.
“Excuse me?” Polly asks, her voice shaking with anger. “What right do you have…?”
“More right than you,” Georgia says, turning to face Polly, her false smile fading. “After all, I’m the one that’s still here.”
“Alright, that’s enough,” I say, stepping forward. Strangely, I feel calmer in the face of Georgia and Polly being upset.
“She needs to leave,” Polly says, glaring first at Georgia and then at me.
With that, any nervousness left abruptly dies.
“No,” I say. Polly’s expression turns shocked. “Georgia is staying. I asked her here, because, yes, you left ten years ago and I was nervous about seeing you.” I glance at Georgia. “Please stop, though, Georgia, or we won’t get anywhere.”
“Sorry,” Georgia says, backing down.
“And you won’t come into my home and start making demands,” I say, turning back to Polly. “You’re coming into my house, because you want to see the daughter you left me to raise. You won’t set the terms for how this goes. Now, it’s up to you; you can either deal with Georgia sitting here quietly, or you can walk out that door and never come back.”
Polly hesitates. And then, slowly, she sits down at the table.
“I would like a coffee, please,” she says stiffly, yet politely, to Georgia.
I give Georgia a hard look, and she nods, quirking a small, impressed smile before busying herself with the coffees. I take a seat at the table too and breathe in deeply one last time.
It’s off to a bad start but, just maybe, we can salvage this.
Chapter Eleven
Ethan
Georgia is staring at me. I know she has never seen me stand up to Polly like that before. Even when we were together, I would back down when her temper flared, well aware that things could escalate and get ugly if we both got angry. I think my reaction surprised Polly, too.
