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I glared at him, in a worse mood than I’d already been. “Fuck right off.”
It had been inevitable that Steve and Jake had picked up on the whole me and Piper thing – or lack of thing, as the case may be. None of us had outright stated there was a thing – or lack of thing – but they knew. We all knew.
“All of you can fuck right off,” I snapped, pointing my smoke at him before I went to head Piper off halfway across the oval.
My hand went to her stomach and my lips dropped to her ear. Just the feel of her, the smell of her, my heart stopped racing quite so fast. My breathing steadied. All the fucking noise in my head died down to a whisper I could ignore at least for a moment.
“Not causing trouble today?” she asked me.
“Obviously not enough if you haven’t heard about it,” I replied. Trouble for me was so normal that I couldn’t even think what about my day had been trouble and what hadn’t.
She smiled as she looked me over. “What’s up?”
“I have to go pick up Maddy. But I should be back by end of the day,” I told her. I didn’t know how I’d be back at the end of the day, but fuck if I wasn’t going to need to see her at the end of it.
“She okay?” Piper asked.
“Yeah, I–” I shook my head. “I don’t know. I think so, but who knows. Mum just said I needed to go get her because she can’t get off work.” I took a drag of my smoke. “There’s a whole car seat thing and I need to go now.”
“Are you okay?”
I looked at her and found she was looking at me. Everything in me stilled as we just looked at each other. But it couldn’t stay that way. All I wanted was to stay with her there in that moment. But there was a fucking jock waiting for her on the other side of the oval, and my sick niece waiting on me.
“No,” I told her honestly.
“All right. Need anything?”
I shook my head. “Not now.”
I needed everything now, but I couldn’t have it. I didn’t know that I wanted to talk to her about it later, but I did know I at least wanted to not talk about it later.
“Okay. Well–” she started.
“–I know where to find you,” I finished. “I know.” Even my absolutely shitty mood couldn’t stop me appreciating that.
I moved to leave, but she put a hand on my chest.
She said my name. Nothing but my name and it was everything. “Roman?”
“Piper?” I replied, mimicking her tone.
“I can get the bus if it’s easier?”
That was the last thing I wanted. I needed to see her later, so I needed to not be a dick to her now.
I dropped my forehead to hers and breathed deeply, picturing me kissing her and it making everything okay again. “No, it’s fine. I could do with some decent company this afternoon.”
I left her there and it was one of the hardest things I’d ever done. It felt like something was coming. Something big. Something bad. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but doom settled in the pit of my stomach, and I couldn’t dislodge it.
It made me nearly throw Maddy’s car seat across the parking lot at Mum’s work because I couldn’t fucking get the seatbelt fitted properly quick enough. But I got myself another smoke and pretended that wasn’t adding to my anxiety.
I finally walked into the front office of the primary school and looked around for my niece. Fuck knew what state she’d be in. And I had a tendency for thinking the worst.
I found her. And she looked all in one piece at least. My heart rate started to slow again, but the sense of doom hadn’t budged.
“Uncie Roman!” she said, but she sounded tired.
“You okay, Mads?” I asked as I dropped in front of her.
