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Shawna
My heart skipped a beat when Nate walked through the door today. I don’t know what it is about him, but just the sight of him lights my body up. I’ve never felt this way toward a man before, so this is uncharted territory for me. He’s like my fantasy come to life … and this fantasy made me come several times last night with the help of my toy.
I have to admit, I was bummed I only got to talk to him for a couple of minutes when he first arrived. Then, he only waved goodbye when he and Rob got up to leave. I know I shouldn’t have any expectations, but I was hoping to spend more time with him.
Oh, well.
As I walk through the front door at home, I’m hit with the scent of Mom’s chili. I’ve always loved Mom’s chili, and although I wasn’t feeling hungry before, now I can’t wait to eat.
“Mom!” Noah calls as he runs down the hall from the kitchen. “You’re home!”
“I am,” I reply, hanging my coat up, then giving him a hug. “How was your day?”
“It was good. Grandma’s making chili for dinner!”
“I can smell it. It smells delicious!”
We walk together to the kitchen, where I find Mom setting something in the oven.
“Oh, hi, honey,” Mom says. “Just putting the cornbread in the oven.”
“It smells good. I can’t wait to eat!”
Mom closes the oven door. “It should be ready in about twenty minutes.” She looks at Noah, now taking a seat on the floor in the family room with a pile of Lego. Then she turns her attention back to me. Lowering her voice, she says, “I need to tell you something.”
I know it must be serious since she obviously doesn’t want Noah to hear. “Okay. Should
we go to the other room?”
She nods. “Yeah, we probably should.”
Noah’s perfectly content with his toys, so I follow her to the living room. My imagination starts going wild with what she has to tell me, but I don’t have to wait very long to find out.
As soon as we walk into the room, Mom looks at me. “Alice passed away today.”
Of all the things I imagined her saying, that was not one of them. “Oh.”
“All I know is that she had a heart attack. I’m not sure of all the details.”
“How did you find out?” I ask, unsure of what to feel right now. Alice never liked me, and she’s one of the few people on this earth I didn’t like either. She was a bitter woman who wanted everyone to be as miserable as she was, and her heavy drinking didn’t help matters.
“Shirley called and told me. You know how she is. She always hears the town gossip somehow.”
Nodding, I’m truly stunned. “Wow. Well, I guess that’s that … I don’t know what else to say, honestly.”
Mom rubs my arm. “I know, honey. It’s okay.”
Suddenly, an unpleasant thought comes to mind. “You don’t think he’ll come back to town now, do you?”
Mom shakes her head. “I have no idea. I guess we’ll have to wait and see. Although if he does come back to town, we may not even know it. He hasn’t contacted you in seven years, so why would he do it now?”
I suppose she’s right. There’s no way to predict whether he’ll return to Port Townsend. Although the thought of his reappearance concerns me, there’s no use in worrying about it since there’s nothing I can do about it anyway.
However, I should probably be prepared, just in case. If Jarred does come back and wants to see his son, I need to be ready to tell Noah. He’s never met his dad, aside from the few times when he was an infant, so Noah has no recollection of it. A couple of years ago, he asked me where his dad was, and I told him the truth when I said I didn’t know, that his dad had to leave town when he was a baby and just never returned. Noah accepted the answer, though I know it made him ponder. Having never met his father, though, I suppose he doesn’t have a reason to miss him, but he does have a reason to be curious.
Noah has never met anyone on Jarred’s side of the family, including Alice. She never even saw him when he was a baby. She didn’t want to. That’s how heartless she was. The thought of her contacting me someday and wanting to finally meet her grandson crossed my mind a few times over the years, but she never did. Now that she’s gone, it’ll never happen.
But Jarred could return now. I know I shouldn’t worry about it, but it’s going to be practically impossible for me not to.
