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“What’s your name?” I asked her.
She let out a big, deep breath, and her shivering finally stopped. “I’m Harlow Keaton.”
Harlow. It was kind of a funny name, but I liked it.
“Does that mean we’re friends now?” she asked, tilting her head to the side so she could look up at me.
“Sure,” I answered with a shrug. “I don’t have a lot of friends. Just my brothers. They bug me sometimes, though.”
She giggled. “My sister bugs me too. I think I’d like to be your friend. You don’t throw snowballs, and I’ve never seen you push down any girls.”
I scoffed. “No way.”
Harlow wrapped her arms around my waist, and we stood like that until the teacher blew the whistle for us to go inside. Without thinking, I took my coat off before she ran off to get in line. “Here, why don’t you keep it?”
Her eyes went all big in her face, and she blinked a few times. “What?”
“Take it,” I said. But she didn’t move, so I pushed it into her gloved hands. Slowly, she pulled it toward her, staring at it like she’d never seen a coat before.
“Won’t you get in trouble if you don’t come home with it?” she asked, clutching the black and yellow material to her chest.
“Nah.”
With a shy smile, she tugged it up over her arms, and it was so big on her, it came to her knees.
She gave me my gloves back, and we traded another smile. “Thanks, Ian,” she said. “I’ve never had a friend do something like this for me before.”
I puffed my chest out again and stood a little bit taller. “I promise you’ll never go cold as long as I’m around,” I told her with as much seriousness as I could muster because I was trying really hard not to shiver as soon as the coat was gone. But I was a man, so I’d never let it show.
She smiled so big, I saw that gap in her tooth.
The whistle blew again, and Harlow took off running.
Brady popped up behind me and whacked me in the back with a snowball. “Oooh, you were hugging her,” he teased. “Ian’s got a girlfriend.”
I bent down and scooped up a huge handful of snow and whirled around. He tried to duck, but I got him square in the chin.
“Hey,” he whined. “You’re not supposed to hit in the face.”
I grabbed his coat and yanked him closer. “Quit throwing snowballs at the girls, Brady, and I won’t knock you in the face with one tomorrow.”
He nodded, ripping out of my grasp and running away.
I walked to the class line and found my spot at the end. From across the playground, tucked safely in my coat, Harlow waved, and even though I was freezing, I smiled the whole way back inside.
Chapter 1
Harlow
As a single woman—and up-until-last-week resident of New York—I had a well-honed instinct for when someone stared at me. All the little hairs stood up on the back of my neck, and if I’d been on the subway, I might have dug into my giant purse for a can of pepper spray.
But being back in Sisters, Oregon, the most likely culprit of anyone’s undivided attention would be something along the lines of, Oh, I wonder if that’s Estelle and Robert’s youngest, I heard she had a kid a few years ago and never heard from the father again when she found out she was pregnant.
If that was the reason behind the look, walking around with a sign taped to my back would be easier.
Yes, I am Estelle and Rob’s youngest, less-perfect daughter.
Yes, I am a single mom.
