by Ivy Smoak
“It’s whatever you want, Penny. I just want to know so I don’t worry.” His gaze dropped to my lips again for just a moment. I would have missed it if I hadn’t been looking.
I shook my head. I doubt he’d worry with Porter and Briggs following us all day. “Ellen said she was cooking. So we’ll be back for dinner.”
“Good. I’ll see you around 6 then.”
“Fine.”
“Great.” He walked away without another word.
Again I found myself staring at his ass. My stomach twisted in a knot. That whole conversation had been angry and hostile and…hot. Hot? Why the hell did I think him being pissed off was sexy? But God, it was. I wanted to grab the back of his neck and pull him into a kiss. And rip his clothes off. And bite his skin. I wanted to know what it actually felt like for him to thrust inside of me.
God. What the hell is wrong with me? I had completely lost my mind.
Chapter 28
Monday
“And that’s a red one like me,” Scarlett said and pointed to the red panda with her free hand. Her other hand was holding Melissa’s. It had been ever since we had left the apartment. Scarlett would barely look at me. At least it seemed like Melissa had forgiven me for running away. I wasn’t sure what I’d do if they both hated me.
“It is like you,” Melissa said with a laugh.
“But they come in big sizes when they aren’t red. The black and white ones are huge. But I’ve never seen one here. Daddy says one’s coming soon. But I don’t know when soon is. It feels like I’ve been waiting forever.” She stepped forward to get an even better look at the red panda.
“Real pandas are cool, but do you know what’s even better?” Melissa asked.
Scarlett shook her head.
“Red ones.” She crouched down and tickled Scarlett’s side, sending her into a fit of giggles. “You know, I bet if you crawled in there you could blend in.”
“Really?” Scarlett looked so excited. “Do you think I’m allowed to go in to play with them?”
“Only if your dad says yes. Next time he’s here with you, definitely ask him. You can tell him I said it was okay.” She winked at Scarlett.
Scarlett nodded enthusiastically and then looked back at the exhibit.
Melissa was so good with her. I could have gotten mad at her for digging that hole with James. Next time Scarlett came here she’d think she was allowed in the red panda exhibit. But I wasn’t upset at all. Melissa was just being a good aunt. Her first instinct wasn’t to tell Scarlett that pandas would never come to the Central Park Zoo. She had just casually changed the topic to distract Scarlett. It was brilliant. And I was a little jealous that they were the ones bonding. This was my chance to get closer to Scarlett and I was holding back. I wasn’t even sure why.
A chill ran down my spine and I glanced over my shoulder. Porter and Briggs were standing a few paces away, watching us. I wasn’t sure I’d ever get used to that feeling. It gave me the creeps.
“Hey…you.” Scarlett poked my knee.
Speaking of little creeps. Why didn’t she call me Mommy? Her most affectionate term for me was you? That was so weird. “What’s up, Scarlett?”
“Daddy said if I got hungry you’d have a snack for me.” She did that squinted eye thing at me. “That’s me now. Hungry.”
“Oh. Right.” I opened up my purse and pulled out the blue snack pack of gummies. “Here you go.” I handed it to her.
She looked at it and then lifted her head back up to me. “No. My snack.” She tried to hand it back.
“This is your snack.”
She shook her head back and forth.
“Yes it is. It’s a fruit gummy snack in a blue bag. Just like your dad said you liked.”
“It’s not the right one. This says…” she scrunched her mouth to the side as she looked at the package. “Fib…fibey…fieb…”
“Fiber fruit snacks,” I said.
“Mine aren’t fibey snacks. Mine are shaped like animals. These are yours and Daddy’s.”
How different could they be? “Do you want to try one? You might like it.”
“No.”
I laughed. “I’m sure it tastes the same as yours. Just try it.”
“I don’t want to. I want my animal snack. We’re at the zoo. At the zoo you eat animal snacks.”
That wasn’t very sound logic. She was basically implying that you should eat the animals at the zoo. What a little carnivore. I crouched down and took the bag away from her. “Here, I’ll show you that these are good too.” I opened it up and ate one. They were fine. “See, it’s good. Try one.”
Scarlett shook her head as she looked at me. “You’re not very good at this thing.” And then she grabbed the bag and ran back over to Melissa.
What thing? Being her mother? I sighed and stood back up. Why did this kid hate me so much? But at least she was eating the fruit snacks. She liked them just fine. She finished them within a few minutes and then ran back over to me.
“Here,” she said and tried to hand me the bag.
“I’m sure there’s a trashcan around here somewhere. Let’s go find one.”
“That’s your job.” She threw the empty bag at my feet.
This was not going well. I needed to turn things around somehow. “Did you want more fruit snacks?” I asked. “I have a few more packs.” I pulled the rest of the bags out of my purse.
She stared at me. “I can have all those?”
It was only three more packs. She was acting like I was giving her the biggest treat ever. “Of course.” I handed them to her.
She immediately grabbed them and ran back over to Melissa, leaving me with the trash at my feet. I guess I had been diminished to a human waste bin and food dispenser. Great. I needed to turn this day around. As soon as I found a trashcan. I turned in a circle but didn’t see any. Well, Scarlett already thought I was a waste bin. Might as well prove her point. I picked up her trash, put it in my purse, and then ran over to catch up to them.
“Do you guys want to go to the tropic zone?” I asked. I fumbled with the map as I pulled it out. “It’s supposed to be creatures of the rainforest. Like lemurs and frogs and snakes.”
“Snapes?” Scarlett tried to hide behind Melissa.
“No, snakes,” I said. “With a ‘K’.”
“I don’t like snapes,” Scarlett said.
“Okay. Well, there’s also these fancy rainforest pigeons and…”
“Me and my mommy both hate snapes together. I don’t want to be anywhere near snapes.”
Snakes. With a K, Scarlett. I sighed. I wasn’t about to correct her. She already hated me. “Okay, fine. What would you like to see next?”
“Red pandas.”
“But we just saw the red pandas. How about we…”
“I want to see them again. Can’t we, Aunt Melissa? Please?”
“How can I say no to that face?” Melissa said. She laughed as Scarlett pulled her back toward the red panda exhibit.
I was not giving up on today. This was my chance to connect with my daughter. And I was going to find a way to do it. When we reached the red pandas again, I crouched down next to Scarlett. “You know, I used to love red pandas when I was little too. I thought it was so cool that their fur matched my hair.”
Scarlett took a moment to stop staring at the animals to glance at me. “My mommy used to say that.” She gave me a small smile and then turned her attention back to the red pandas. “She loved red pandas too.”
Why did she keep saying stuff like that? Was she implying that I wasn’t her mother? I placed my hand gently on her shoulder. “Scarlett, I’m right here. And I promised you I wasn’t going anywhere.”
She looked at my hand and then my face. “My mommy promised me that too. But she hasn’t come back yet.” She threw her empty snack bags at my feet. “I don’t believe in promises anymore.”
There was so much wrong with what she had said. What kid didn’t believe in promises? And I was literal
ly right here. I was even willing to pick up after her littering little self. I picked up her trash and shoved it in my purse. I was here for her. “Pumpkin…”
“Only Daddy calls me pumpkin.” She shrugged her shoulder to make my hand fall away. And then she scrunched up her face. I thought she was about to cry but then she screamed, “I need the potty!”
“Okay, well…” I opened up my map. “I think there’s one…”
“Aunt Melissa, Aunt Melissa!” Scarlett yelled and ran over to her, ignoring me and my map that would tell us exactly where to go. “I need the potty!”
Melissa lifted her up and started walking as quickly as she could with a kid in her arms. The two of them disappeared into a public restroom a minute later.
I sighed and sat down on a bench to wait. Scarlett didn’t even trust me to take her to the bathroom. Did she really think that I wasn’t her mother? That couldn’t be it. She could see me. She could see that I was the same. I put my chin in my hand.
It might help if I didn’t call her pumpkin again. I basically confessed to her that I was a fraud. Why didn’t I call her that if James did? Was there another nickname I didn’t know of? Today was going horribly, horribly wrong. What could be worse than your own kid not trusting you?
I just needed to ask James more questions about her. I didn’t know any of the facts that a child would expect me to know. Her favorite color. Favorite food. But even the things I knew I kept messing up. I knew her favorite animal and I’d tried to make her look at other things. And I knew her favorite snacks but brought the wrong one. What a freaking disaster. God, what could I do to make her like me?
It would be so much easier if I was just being the fun, cool aunt like Melissa. Well, maybe. I wasn’t exactly fun or cool. If I was being honest, it seemed like Scarlett would hate me as an aunt just as much as she hated me as a mother. There had to be something I could do to make her like me.
Ice cream! Ice cream always fixed everything. At least, it did for me. And if she was my daughter, she was probably obsessed with it too. She clearly liked snacks. Sweets could my ticket to her liking me. I opened up my map again. This would definitely make up for the non-animal fruit snacks I had brought. She was going to freaking love me.
“We had a bit of an incident,” Melissa said.
I looked up. Scarlett was in her arms. Pants-less. There was just a bunch of paper towels wrapped around her waist in a make-shift skirt. She looked like a mini barbarian.
“What happened to her pants?” I asked as I stood up, abandoning my map and any thought of ice cream fixing anything.
I heard Scarlett sniffle. I looked at her tear stained face just in time, because she immediately turned away from me.
Oh, sweetie. All I wanted to do was hug her.
“Her pants couldn’t be saved,” Melissa said. “We didn’t quite make it to the bathroom.”
“So you threw out her pants? Where? I’ll go clean them real quick. I’m sure a little tinkle from such a tiny little girl…”
Melissa cleared her throat. “It was more of a number 2 issue.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah, oh,” Melissa mouthed silently. She pressed her hand against Scarlett’s ear that wasn’t snug against her chest, so that Scarlett wouldn’t hear. “Is she on some kind of juice cleanse I’m not aware of?”
“No…”
“Then what the actual hell? I’ve never even had a poop explosion like that. Do you think she’s sick? Should we take her to the doctor? Did she somehow get into something that would make her crap everywhere? Like some kind of medicine?”
“Oh shit.” I immediately placed my hand over my mouth. I knew cursing was bad around kids, but luckily Melissa’s hand was still covering Scarlett’s ear. I cleared my throat. “I may have given her the wrong fruit snacks.”
“A little snack wouldn’t cause something like this. I think she’s sick. We should definitely take her to a doctor.”
“Would a super fibrous snack cause something like that to happen?”
“What do you mean?”
I pulled one of the wrappers out of my purse.
“You gave her a pack of fiber gummies? Kids can’t handle that much fiber all at once. There’s enough fiber in those to regulate adults. Not infants. What were you thinking?”
“I…I don’t know. I wasn’t thinking. She wanted fruit snacks so I gave her fruit snacks. Several packs actually.”
“More than one? Seriously?” Melissa shook her head like I was the most incompetent person she had ever met. “We need to get her home. It’s probably going to happen again and she’s out of pants.” She lifted her hand off of Scarlett’s ear. “How are you feeling, Scar? Do you want to head home?”
“I don’t feel good. My tummy hurts.”
“Yeah, I know.” Melissa tucked a loose strand of hair behind Scarlett’s ear. “You’re going to be okay. We just need to get you home.”
Scarlett nodded.
God, James was going to kill me. I'd told him I could handle this. And I had basically caused a poop explosion. I was bringing back his daughter without pants. “Do you think there’s time to stop somewhere and get her another pair of pants real quick?” I asked.
“My tummy hurts,” Scarlett said again. “I want Daddy.”
Fuck me.
Chapter 29
Monday
My hand was practically shaking as I unlocked the door. I felt like I had soiled my one chance. Literally.
I glanced at Scarlett. Porter was carrying her now. He gave me a sympathetic smile.
That just made me more nervous. Was that sympathy because he knew I was about to experience James’ wrath? Or because he thought I was a terrible mom? Probably both. Here goes nothing.
As soon as we were inside, Porter set Scarlett down and disappeared back out the door.
I was probably supposed to yell something like, “Honey, I’m home!” But James wasn’t my honey. Besides, I was hoping to sneak Scarlett upstairs and wrassle her into a pair of pants before James saw us.
“Let’s go change,” I said to Scarlett and held out my hand.
She held on to the paper towel skirt for dear life.
“Melissa, can you help me get her upstairs?” I asked.
“James is going to find out one way or the other. Scarlett still doesn’t feel well.” She tussled Scarlett’s hair.
Traitor.
“Daddy!” Scarlett yelled.
They were all a bunch of traitors. Damn it!
James walked into the foyer. He pushed his hair off his forehead, like he was trying to look more presentable. As if he ever looked un-presentable.
“I didn’t expect you back so soon…” his voice trailed off when he looked down at Scarlett. “Pumpkin, what happened?”
Scarlett immediately let go of her paper towel skirt, sending it to the floor, and ran over to James. Her little naked butt was the biggest traitor of all.
“What happened to your pants?” James asked as he lifted her into his arms.
“She fed me a bad snack.” The little traitor pointed directly at me.
“It was just a tiny accident,” Melissa said. “We didn’t make it to the bathroom in time. No big deal.”
Thank you, Melissa.
“My tummy hurts,” Scarlett said.
Was she trying to get me in trouble?
“She gave me fibey snacks. And they made my tummy hurt.”
James looked up at me. “What is she talking about?”
This time Melissa didn’t come to my rescue. I was on my own. “I grabbed the wrong fruit gummies. She wanted a snack and I only had the fiber ones. Apparently those aren’t for kids. But I had no way of knowing that, James. I seriously thought it would be okay, or else I wouldn’t have fed them to her.”
“It doesn’t matter.” But the way he said it didn’t make me believe him. His tone screamed, "It matters a lot, you incompetent idiot." He adjusted Scarlett onto his hip. “Let’s go get you cleaned up, pumpkin.”
/> I sighed as they left the foyer.
“So that went well,” Melissa said. “He didn’t even seem that mad.”
“Are you kidding? He was so pissed.”
“Really? He said it didn’t matter.” She shrugged.
She couldn’t tell that he was mad? Maybe I knew him better than I thought. Or maybe I’m remembering. I shook the thought away. If I was remembering, I’d know what to do around Scarlett. I’d be a good mom. I clearly wasn’t remembering anything.
“So, I’m supposed to meet Josh for dinner in a bit. I thought I’d leave you to get better acquainted with your family tonight.”
“You’re abandoning me?”
She laughed. “No. But family dinners are something you always do. Maybe it’ll trigger a memory.” She smiled. “Is it okay if I go get ready?” She was already backing away.
Maybe she wasn’t abandoning me. But it felt like she was. “Yeah, that’s fine.”
“Don’t worry about today. It happens to the best of us.”
I knew that wasn’t true. She had said that she had never even experienced such a big bowel movement. I sighed. I just hoped tonight would get better. I walked into the living room and froze.
The room wasn’t the same at all. There were no longer any empty hooks in the walls. There were pictures everywhere. Images of me and James. Pictures of Scarlett. Photos of us with our friends and family. Ones with all of us together. And in every single one we were all laughing and smiling.
Scarlett’s laughter drifted downstairs. It was foreign to me. Just like the pictures on the wall.
James had removed the pictures to help me ease back into my life. He had tried to erase everything we had. And I wasn’t sure why. I tried to wipe away the tears in my eyes, but they just kept coming. These images were proof of what we had. The majority of them weren’t professionally done or posed. They were candids. And I could see it on my face. I could see the love. In several photos, I wasn’t even facing the camera, I was staring at James like I adored him. Like he was the only person I ever wanted to see. Like I lived to wake up next to him. And to fall asleep in his arms at night.
