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She barely cried.
But she did with him and it was devastating. Harder yet to stick to his guns and do what he had.
It killed him to break her heart.
It destroyed him to let her go.
He couldn’t come back here and she’d never leave.
It was wrong of him to drag her along knowing that. She didn’t understand. He knew that. But he had to make the cut final so that they could both move on.
The last fight with his father had been the straw that broke his back. Maybe it would have been wiser to calm down before making such harsh decisions and he’d always blame himself for that.
She was exactly where he figured she’d be. Working with kids in her hometown.
This wasn’t anything he’d thought would happen in his life.
“Some people do and some don’t,” she said.
“Tell me about you the past few years,” he said. “We can talk more about your other questions when Max is in bed. He’s normally out by seven.”
She turned and looked at the clock on the wall. This rental house was small. A one-story ranch with two bedrooms and one bath. One bedroom could barely be considered that, but it fit a crib with the single bed frame and not much walking room. There was a dresser inside the closet and it was good enough for him.
No changing table like he was used to at home and made do changing his son on the furniture or the floor, sometimes his bed. It was temporary and he was thrilled he’d been able to find the place.
His room had a queen sized bed that sucked for someone who’d been sleeping in a king, but there was a desk in the corner that he could work at when the time came.
“You said he was in a routine. That’s great for his age. How often does he get up at night for you? Or does he sleep all the way through?”
“Once a night,” he said. “I give him a bottle that he pounds as if he were doing shots at a bar, then burps his approval and is normally back to sleep before I lay him down again.”
She laughed. “That has to be a sight to see.”
“It is. It’s taken time to get there. I’d say it’s only been once a night for the past six weeks. The first night here he slept through the night and I had a heart attack that something was wrong with him when he didn’t wake up.”
It’s like his body was used to knowing Max would get up around midnight for his bottle and when he didn’t, he bolted up and ran in there to see if his son was still breathing.
“I’m sure the trip exhausted him,” she said.
“That was my guess. He got up at six like normal. He was crying and scared and it broke my heart a little.”
There was a tender smile on her face as she took a bite of her pizza with one hand and put some jarred fruit into Max’s mouth with the other.
“A strange place. I’m surprised you didn’t set him up in your room.”
“I thought of it. There isn’t space, for one, and two, I realized that might be a bigger habit to break than him getting used to this place.”
“Smart,” she said. “A lot of parents wouldn’t have done that. Or realized it.”
“I tend to think things to death. I want to do the right thing but know it’s not always possible.”
“Tell me about it,” she said quietly.
He ignored that comment for the moment.
“So back to you,” he said. “What have you been doing the past few years other than getting your business up and running?”
“I was working in a PreK for someone else. I found I enjoyed it more than teaching. I had substitute taught for a year and realized having more control appealed to me. Then Zane came back from the service and had to raise Willow alone. It’s funny how you’ve got pretty much the same story as my brother.”
