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Julia
“Happy birthday!”Imogene exclaimed once I answered her FaceTime call, her cheerful, innocent face popping up on the screen.
After my late night — or early morning, depending on how you looked at it — I thought I’d have had no trouble falling asleep.
But every time I closed my eyes, I saw Chris’ blue gaze staring back at me. Felt the warmth of his lips moving against mine. Melted into his electrifying embrace as he held me in a way I doubted I’d ever been held before. Eager. Greedy. Consuming.
With a few mind-blowing kisses, he’d left me a tightly wound bundle of nerves. I doubted even the Mount Olympus of vibrators that Naomi insisted I procure would help disperse all the pent-up energy coursing through me.
So hearing from my daughter was a much-needed distraction.
Plus, it meant a lot to me that she thought enough to call on my birthday, even though she was surrounded by her friends. That was just the type of compassionate, giving daughter I was blessed with.
“Thanks, sweetie.” I beamed at her, my heart full at the mere sight of my mini-me. “How’s camp going?”
“Great.” She smiled brightly.
It was a smile that would soon attract the attention of teenage boys. Hell, it probably already had. After all, Imogene was fourteen, not the innocent child I still wished she were. She was a smart kid with a good head on her shoulders and an amazing heart inside her. I still struggled with letting her out into the world to discover how dark and twisted it could be. I wanted to keep her locked up where no one would ever hurt her.
This was the part of being a mother no one warned you about. How you spent years raising them, molding them into this incredible human. But eventually, you had to let them live. Had to let them be free to make their own decisions. Their own mistakes.
The idea of any harm coming to my beautiful girl made my heart squeeze. I doubted that would ever stop, even when she was an adult with children of her own, if that was the path she wanted to take.
“What have you been doing?” I pressed.
“Yesterday was the first day, so it was just a bunch of getting to know your cabin mates and group kind of things. I’m helping with arts and crafts for the little tykes in the morning, then with archery and soccer in the afternoon.”
My heart swelled with pride. Every parent was proud of their child’s accomplishments, but Imogene had been through so much in her life. Born with a heart defect that required surgery when she was mere months old, the first year of her life was an endless stream of doctor appointments, late-night trips to the ER when her temperature rose just a bit, and nerve-wracking surgeries. Through it all, she proved to be a fighter.
Now she was as healthy as every other teenager. While she did have to take it easy compared to other kids, she didn’t let anything prevent her from following her dreams. If she was passionate about something, she’d find a way. She was the most determined little girl I’d ever met.
“That’s wonderful, sweetie. There’s no one better to teach them, especially soccer.”
She smiled, glancing over her shoulder.
“Do you need to go?”
“A few of us counselors are going for a quick swim in the lake before dinner.”
“Then go,” I urged.
“I don’t mind. I want to talk to you.”
“You don’t have to do that. Go spend some time with your friends. I—”
“You coming, Mo?” someone asked in the background.
And it wasn’t a girl.
Imogene’s expression brightened, her cheeks reddening. “I’ll be right there, Roman.” She kept her gaze turned toward the source for a protracted beat before looking back to the phone, her eyes averted.
“And who’s Roman?” I pressed, half-teasing, half-serious.
She shrugged, pinching her lips together to fight her growing smile. “I go to school with him. He’s a junior. Plays on the varsity soccer team, too. A mid-fielder.”
I nodded, pretending to know what that was. If it weren’t for Wes, my brother, sitting next to me at Imogene’s games, explaining what was going on, I’d have been completely lost. The only position I could pick out on the field was the goalie.
“We’re running the soccer clinic together.”
