AllFreeNovel
Share Us
But as I watch him dote on his little girl, I can't help but smile. It seems to come so easy to him, which blows me away. Being kid-friendly is definitely not something I thought Nick had in his skill set.
“You look like a natural,” I comment.
He gives me a lopsided grin. “Anything but,” he remarks. “It's a process and I'm still learning something new – several somethings, actually – every single day. No, Abigail is the natural at this, and I'm just trying to keep my head above water.”
The baby in his lap makes a gurgling sound that sort of resembles a laugh. A big string of drool rolls out of her mouth, running down her chin, and almost off, before Nick grabs a napkin and deftly wipes it away.
“Looked pretty natural to me,” I say.
“You get used to it,” Nick grins. “It's all about anticipating.”
I laugh and watch him. “You know, I didn't think I'd ever say it, but it looks good on you,” I smile. “Being a dad.”
Nick smiles warmly down at his daughter. “She's changed me in a million different ways, man,” he replies. “As did her mom.”
“Speaking of which, why didn't Abigail come out with you this time?”
“She's got to study for her finals,” he tells me. “She's finishing up her nursing program and since I only did a daylong seminar up at UCSB, it didn't seem worth it since she would have been buried in her books the whole time. So, Phoenix and I decided to come down. They had a pretty nice childcare center. Didn’t they, sweetie?”
He winks at his baby and pokes her lightly on the nose, drawing a giggle from Phoenix. Nick is a pretty prominent surgeon back in New York and often goes all over the country to lecture or give presentations on surgical techniques and the like.
“Yeah, that makes sense,” I muse. “You're going to have to get her out here at some point, though. I like her a lot, man. She's good for you.”
“She's very good for me and she likes you a lot too,” Nick fixes me with an inscrutable expression. “And she wants to know when you're going to find a woman who's good for you too.”
A wry grin touches my lips. “Yeah, I'm not so sure that's in the cards for me.”
“Why not?”
I shrug. “Just haven't run across anybody who's lit that fuse in me.”
Nick takes a drink of his iced tea and sets the glass back down. “I hadn't either – not until I met Abigail.”
“Yeah well, not all of us get that fairy-tale happy ending.”
“You never know, man,” he remarks. “Like I said, life comes at you hard and fast. Stuff you never thought would come to pass, suddenly does.”
He perches Phoenix on his knee, the smile on his face seemingly etched permanently into his features. He's not wrong about life coming at you hard and fast sometimes. Unlike Nick, I really don't see my path including marriage and a family – though, I won't deny that there is a certain appeal to it for me.
The idea of having a stable life, a woman I love more than life itself, and even kids, is a pleasant thought – more of a whisper of a dream, really – that's passed through my mind every now and then. But the reality of it all is that I'm thirty-four years old, obsessed with my work, and have absolutely zero dating prospects, let alone spousal prospects on or anywhere near the horizon.
I just don't see it happening for me.
I look up to see Nick grinning at me. “What?”
“I just know that look,” he says. “I know what's going through your head right now. I see how skeptical you are.”
“I've always been skeptical,” I remind him. “About almost everything.”
“That's true,” he replies.
I pick at my plate, popping a French fry into my mouth as I look around the small patio. I see a pair of gorgeous twenty-something-year-old women sitting a couple of tables over from us, a look of absolute awe on their faces as they watch Nick doting on his daughter. Nothing like a big strong, good-looking man with a baby to send hearts fluttering, I suppose.
What's odd to me is that Nick doesn't even seem to notice them. Back in the day, he would have been all over them like the proverbial white on rice. Of the five of us, Nick was the oldest, the one always leading us into shenanigans, and probably the one who was deepest into the bachelor lifestyle. He had a different girl practically every night. Back then, if those two women had been looking at him like they are right now, he would have taken both of them home right there on the spot.
But that was then, and this is now, apparently, because he's so caught up in Phoenix that the two blondes ogling him like he's the Second Coming may as well not even exist. It's like he doesn't see them or feel the weight of their very obvious stares at him.
“Wow, I think I need to get one of those,” I chuckle as I gesture to Phoenix. “Seems to be a chick magnet.”
