Page 77 of 10 Signs You Need to Grovel

Ricky sneaks a glance at Max, who seems to be grilling Jasmine’s mom on jewelry design, then he gives me an intense stare, proving how unsubtle I was. “For me, coming out to my parents was a bit of a bomb drop. I mean”—he points at his uniform of worn jeans and threadbare T-shirt—“I don’t tick a lot of my-kid-is-gay boxes. I’ve always been a bit of a slob, and I’m a carpenter. Always liked typical ‘boy’ stuff like hammers and fixing things and rough sports, never got curious about wearing girl’s clothes or playing with dolls like Aaron. So yeah—my folks were surprised.”

“They didn’t take it well?”

“My dad actually took the news pretty smoothly, but my mom got mad at first. Confused more than anything, I think. So if I had advice for random parents today,” he says, half-heartedly pretending we’re not talking about me, “I’d tell them that even if they think there’s no chance their kid’s gay, they should have the what-if conversation with each other anyway. Address how they’d deal with that news as a team—the best ways to make sure their kid feels accepted and loved, so if he or she or they are bi or ace or trans or gay or whatever, you bypass that angry shocked phase. All I wanted to hear from my parents was that they loved me no matter who I loved.” He slaps my arm and gives it a squeeze. “If you ever need to chat, I’m just a call away.”

Leaving me to chew on that nugget of wisdom, he joins Aaron at the miniature tree vendor. I’m about to grab Max and pay for those earrings, but a redheaded woman stops in front of me. Normally, I’d say this woman is beautiful—traffic-stopping gorgeous in a fashion-magazine way with fiery hair, a collection of freckles that puts Sadie’s dusting to shame, glowing pale skin, and eyes so green they glint like jewels—but the only way to describe her intent expression is spiteful.

“Seems like we have a Bower boys epidemic in town. Y’all keep popping up like a rash.”

I squint at her. “Do I know you?”

“Maggie Edelstein. Delilah’s best friend.”

I grin. Really fucking wide. The Maggie Edelstein. “You know Lennon, right?”

“Hardly.” But she breathes faster, and an intense blush sears her cheeks. “We ran in different crowds.”

“Interesting.”

“Not really.”

“I mean, the fact that you both deny hanging out together but have intense reactions to each other’s names is pretty interesting.” This whole Lennon-Maggie mystery is even more fun than I imagined.

She curls her lip, doing an excellent impression of my resting pissed-off face. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. I was asked to find you and tell you E’s busy signing books but would really like a grilled cheese from Marni’s food truck. Do with that information what you will.”

She lifts her head and marches off.

I smirk at her retreating back, then pay for Max’s gift and take his hand, pleased with my interactions today, caring less if others gawk at me. There are plenty of judgy stares and whispers, along with a few too-eager-to-be-casual hellos from people I barely liked in high school, but we visit Mrs. Jackson’s booth and joke about Mom’s awful quilts. Max volleys curious questions at the artists we meet, like why they chose a certain subject when painting or how the colors in a work made them feel. Sadie-style questions, like the times we’d go to galleries and try to get into an artist’s head. She’s raised Max to be insightful and probing, and I love her even more for it.

We visit E in Delilah’s cute coffee shop to drop off his grilled cheese. While there, a woman I don’t know, who sports a retro eighties perm, stares at me so hard I give up all pretense of not caring, cross my arms, and stare right back. She actually wins.

By the time we’ve exhausted every art booth in town, I make a decision. Sadie hasn’t invited me to stay for dinner, but it’s time I show her I can adapt to her life instead of her needing to find sitters and adapt to mine. Max and I hit Duke’s Market—Windfall’s mom-and-pop grocery shop. He zooms around, helping me find the ingredients for my tried-and-true chicken, tomato soup, and rice casserole. Once we’re back outside, walking the six blocks to his home, he gets quiet. Probably the sugar crash.

Switching the grocery bag to my left hand, I squeeze his shoulder. “Everything okay?”

He fiddles with the hem of his T-shirt. “Thanks for taking me to the walk,” he says softly. After a beat, he looks up at me and adds, “Dad.”

Someone get a medic. A defibrillator and oxygen mask. Pretty sure my heart just flat-out stopped. I quit walking and crouch beside him. “Thank you. I had the best time today.”

He touches my arm, giving me a timid smile that flays me. “I wish you were staying over. That you lived with us.”

My obvious gut reaction is hell yeah, me too, but that’s an admission I need to hide. No way I’ll paint Sadie as the holdout in our reconciliation. “Your mom and I were apart a long time. For now, we’re just friends who are lucky enough to have an amazing kid together. I’ll be seeing you more. Spending more time with you both, and taking you to that baking class, but staying over isn’t in the cards right now.”

Instead of harping on what we don’t have yet, I stand and take his hand, searching for a new topic. Something so he doesn’t feel too sad about our living arrangement or too vulnerable after calling me Dad. But hell. Dad.

“Divergent,” I say once we’re walking. We haven’t held our second book club yet. He was too busy last hike sketching mushrooms and too pumped about the art walk today. “Which faction would you be in?”

He swings our hands and adds a hop to his step, recovering quickly from our talk. “Amity, I think. A peacekeeper. I don’t like fighting. You’d for sure be Dauntless.”

“Why Dauntless?” The Dauntless are the brave ones in that dystopian world, but they’re also violent. The aggressors. Maybe it’s my resting pissed-off face.

“You’re big and strong, and you stand up for the little guy,” he says matter-of-factly, like he didn’t just compliment the heck out of me.

I should really buy a defibrillator and keep it close.

“And you’re gonna be a lawyer,” he adds. “Mom said you’re gonna fight to make people happier. That’s Dauntless stuff. The good kind of Dauntless.”

I love that Sadie’s been talking to Max about me. That they’re both proud I’m going back to school, even though it’s more than pride on her end. Like with Justin Bernardini, she’s latched on to my future plans so my kid thinks I’m more than a stagnant bartender who sometimes leads hikes. Not that it matters. They’re both looking ahead. Seeing what I can be, not what I have been. In their eyes, I have a promising future.