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Suddenly I felt Ember’s pinky hook around mine, and we sat there together, holding hands on a public bench in the middle of the harvest festival I’d sworn I’d never attend. Sophie came running over to us, laughing and giggling, telling us we had to carve pumpkins this year so she could separate the seeds, all while Ember’s hand stayed in mine.

Chapter Nine

Ember

Nine days before Halloween

Even though it had only been a few days since we’d expressed how we felt about one another, things had changed between Everett and I. Every morning since I’d wake and make my way down to the kitchen to find Everett already up, making us coffee. We’d sit together in the quiet of the early morning and talk at the kitchen table for a bit before he started his day. We’d talk about how Sophie was doing with her spelling and math and her coding class, and he’d always want an update on where I was in my manuscript. During the day he’d take regular breaks, coming out for a coffee refill, lunch and dinner. At night, after tucking Sophie into bed, he’d come up and kiss her goodnight, and then I’d settle in either the living room or the kitchen, as usual, to get more words in.

Everett had started texting me throughout the day as well. Sometimes the messages were flirty and playful, reminding me I’d left my black thong in his office, and other times they were tasks like getting Sophie new sneakers or calling in a repairman to look at the dishwasher.

He never mentioned the frame Sophie had gotten him, but I knew it sat on the corner of his desk, holding our photo. I’d caught him staring at it with a slight smile on his face a few times since he placed it there. We still hadn’t discussed what we were to one another either, but everything pointed to us being a couple starting out in a new relationship.

We slept together every chance we got, more now than before, and we ignored whatever this was going on between us and pretended that this could be a sustainable arrangement. There should have been professional and ethical boundaries that we didn’t cross, and there were so many reasons this arrangement was a terrible idea and would probably never work out, but neither of us spent time thinking of those. The only reason I was thinking of it now was because I had written every single one of them into my manuscript the other night and deleted them all because even fictional Rosie knew they were all bullshit.

Knowing that this situation was nothing but complicated still didn’t change the fact that I woke up every single morning wanting all of this to be real and wanting us to acknowledge it so we could move forward.

It was early afternoon, and Sophie and I were sitting at the kitchen table, going over her new spelling notebook. I’d picked it up for her at Everett’s request when we’d gone to get her a pair of boots for the winter.

“Ember, I don’t want to work on spelling today.” She wined.

She’d been cranky since she’d woken up this morning, which was the first time I’d seen her this way since I’d started, but I was choosing to ignore it than to give into her.

“Come on, Soph, two more pages and then we can close this, and you can work on some dinosaur stuff if you like.”

That normally would have got her moving, but Sophie put her pencil down and looked up at me with those huge, sad eyes of hers. I learned that whenever she gave one of us that look, she wanted something.

“What is it?” I asked.

“I was thinking…I want a Halloween party,” she whispered.

“A Halloween party?” I repeated, keeping my voice light.

“Yes, one like Mommy used to do. She would make treats, and we’d carve pumpkins, and people would come in costumes, and there was music and everything. I have pictures,” she said, reaching for her tablet and scrolling down to a saved album.

I looked at the pictures Sophie showed me. She was right. Rebecca had transformed the entire house into a Halloween wonderland, from what I could see. It started with a haunted living room that led down the hallway to the kitchen, where not only were there more decorations but also a large spread of fun Halloween treats. At the exit door, I noticed a large witch holding a black cauldron full of candy.

Most adults and all the children in the pictures wore Halloween costumes. Rebecca was in every photo, and Everett stood beside her in most of them, one arm around her waist.

“She planned it every year. A haunted house, and trick or treating for all my friends in our old neighborhood. It was her favorite thing. She even did it the after she got sick.”

I swallowed hard as I looked down at Sophie’s little hand touching the screen of her tablet. I blinked away the tears that I could feel forming and got up from the table to divert my thoughts.

“Daddy stopped doing everything after. No more trick or treating, no pumpkins, no costumes, no party. Nothing. Do you know he didn’t even buy a Christmas tree last year?”

I poured her a small glass of cider and warmed it in the microwave.

“He is different now since you got here. He laughs, and he watches movies, and you got him to go to the festival, and he told me the other night that he loves the frame I got him because you are in it.”

I stilled and closed my eyes as the microwave beeped. The one thing Everett and I had discussed was keeping our relationship from Sophie. I steadied myself before turning around to face her.

“Well, I think we are both responsible for him laughing and watching movies,” I said, ignoring her comment about the photo frame. I plated two of the pumpkin cookies and brought them over to her.

“No, I think it’s you. I think if we ask him together, he will say yes. Please Ember.”

I should have told her no, but Sophie looked up at me as if I were the key to unlocking Everett.

“Please, Ember?” She cried.