Stacey steps forward.
“Hey, Ev,” she says, then looks down with a smile. “Hi, Elle.”
Evan stops, and there’s a beat where no one else around us seems to notice the shift in the air. Then he turns his head slightly toward me, not taking his eyes off her.
“Take her, Penny,” he says calmly. “Car. Now.”
There’s no room for argument in it, and I don’t give him any.
“Come on, bug,” I say brightly, squeezing Elle’s hand. “Let’s race to the car!”
She hesitates just long enough to look back at the woman, and her brow furrows. Confusion flickers there, maybe a memory trying to surface and not quite making it.
“Daddy?” she asks.
“I’ll be right there,” he says evenly, then glances to me. “I’ll drive.”
I don’t look at Stacey as I guide Elle away, but I can feel her eyes on my back anyway.
At the car, I buckle Elle into her booster with hands that are calm because they have to be. She twists in her seat to see over her shoulder.
“Who is that lady?” she whispers.
“Sit back, sweetheart,” I say gently. “You wanna have penguin pancakes for dinner tonight?”
“With chocolate chips?” she asks automatically, still trying to look over my shoulder.
“Obviously.”
Her little forehead stays wrinkled as I close the door and walk around to the passenger’s side, but I don’t get in straight away. I watch. Evan stands a few feet from Stacey, posture loose in a way that isn’t relaxed. One hand braced on his hip, the other hanging at his side. He keeps the distance deliberate.
I can’t hear most of it through the glass once I’m inside, but I see enough.
Stacey’s hands move, gesturing with open palms as she talks. Trying to placate, I assume. Evan doesn’t mirror her, and he doesn’t step closer. At one point, she reaches toward his arm, and he steps back half a pace. Her mouth tightens, and he says something that seems short and final.
“Daddy looks mad,” Elle says quietly from the back seat.
My eyes flick to the mirror. She’s watching him carefully through the glass, her small fingers twisting in the strap of her backpack.
“He’s just having a grown-up conversation,” I tell her gently, even though the tension rolling off him is visible from here.
After another minute, Stacey says something that makes him roll his eyes, and she looks past him toward the car, where our eyes lock through the windshield.
I don’t look away.
She stares me down for a moment, then turns and walks down the pavement without another word, and Evan stays where he is until she’s halfway to the corner, then he comes back to us.
He gets in the driver’s seat without a word, hands gripping the wheel before he exhales.
“She won’t come back near the school,” he says. “They’ve got her name at the office.”
I nod as he finally turns to me, and reach out to place a palm on his thigh. “Let’s go home.”
We’re barely out of the school zone when Elle speaks.
“Who was that lady?”
Evan’s hands stay steady on the wheel, and I don’t answer. It’s not my place to.
