Page 14

“I just want plain chocolate with no sprinkles,” Mikey ordered.

“What about you, dad?” Ms. Lane asked, looking up from their eager faces to me.

“I was going to follow their lead, but what’s that with the nuts on it?” I quizzed, looking past her at something with caramel and pecans on top.

“Those are my world-famous cinnamon rolls. I make them fresh every morning and sell out every day.”

“In that case, give me two of those.”

“And I want two donuts.” Victor spoke up.

“Nah, you’re not getting two donuts. I don’t want you to have the first one.”

“Aww, man. Why do you get two?” he asked.

“Because I’m four times your size. Plus, I’m the one with the money.”

Mikey laughed at my response, and so did Ms. Lane. I was pretty sure it was the first time that I had heard her laugh, and damn if I didn’t want to hear it again. I was already looking for a way to get back to her truck so I could order more cinnamon rolls in the future, and I hadn’t even tasted the first ones.

“OK, so we have two chocolate donuts, one with sprinkles and one without, and two world famous cinnamon rolls,” she said as I passed her my card.

“You know, I realized that I’ve been calling you Ms. Lane based on Theo’s last name. I never did get your name.”

She rolled her eyes playfully as she gave me back my card. “It’s Shiloh.”

“That’s a pretty name. I’m glad to see you’re back on the road, Shiloh. I’ll have to pull up on you one of these mornings and get some more of these cinnamon rolls.”

“You haven’t even tried them yet.”

I smirked. “I’ll take your word for how good they are.”

“Where is Theo?” Victor asked.

“He’s with my mom. Have you two made up?”

“He said he was sorry for talking about my mom, and I apologized for hitting him. We’ve been playing together at recess.”

“Well, that’s good. I told him that it wasn’t right to say something that would hurt your feelings. It’s none of his business where your mother is.”

It made me feel good to hear how easily my son had forgiven after having a fight. It gave me hope that he was resilient enough not to be permanently scarred from not having his mom around.

I passed the box of donuts to Victor before giving her one last glance. “See you around, Ms. Lane.”

We took our donuts to go. As we headed to my truck, Warren called and let me know that he was off work. Since he’d gotten off early, he wanted the boys to spend the night with him for a change. I didn’t have an argument for that. I needed a little rest.

I didn’t even bother going home to get Victor’s clothes before going straight to Warren’s house. I loved the hell out of my boy, but it had been five or six weekends since I had slept in. He woke up with the roosters every Saturday and Sunday, ready for breakfast. I could have kissed Warren when I pulled up and spotted him standing out in his front yard.

“What’s up, cuz?” he asked as soon as I hopped out of the truck.

The boys had been talking so much that I wanted to pick them up and carry them to the door. I laughed as they climbed out of the truck and ran to the swing set on the side of the house.

“Not too much. Glad you called me. Those boys have way too much energy for me.”

“You ain’t lying. I ain’t been fat my whole life, but I damn sure don’t ever remember having that much energy, even when I was little.”

“If I let him, Victor will stay up ’til two or three in the morning and still get up by seven, talking about ‘Daddy, I want some pancakes.’”

“He better know how to make them if he want some around here. Courtney call herself on a low carb diet. She won’t even let me bring nothing good in the house. I’m about to sneak and take the boys to get ice cream or something after you leave.”