The slice of cheese pizza plops onto his plate. “Your dad likes baseball?”
Charlie takes a nibble, almost like he doesn’t trust the pizza yet, and nods. “Yup. He’s got your picture.”
“My picture?”
“Yup.” He kicks his legs some more and looks around. “Like me.”
“Your dad . . . has my baseball card?”
“Yup. Do you like Christhmas? Nan says I’m gonna get too much again.” He giggles and shakes his head like the next thing he’s about to say is utterly ridiculous. “She says that every year.”
My head is reeling a little. First, Drake has my baseball card. Second, I don’t know why I like that he does.
Ava joins us and we continue the chatter about the upcoming holidays. Charlie admits he wants a football, then quickly adds he wouldn’t mind a baseball too. Pretty sure he said that to spare my feelings. He informs me his dad never asks for anything except a drawing from him, but this year Charlie is upping his game and making a clay ornament with Marianne. Then, he describes in intricate detail all the ways he’s going to paint the rims and ladder on the firetruck cutout. He already has the cookie cutter, after all.
For the first time in a decade, Drake Williams is part of a conversation and I’m not transformed into sharp edges and bared teeth.
“Do you kiss Aunti A?” Charlie says midbite.
I cough after inhaling a gulp of water down the wrong tube. “What?”
Charlie gnaws at his pizza crust; his face is splattered in red sauce. “Do you kiss Auntie A?”
I spare a look at Ava. She’s red in the face, trying not to laugh. I’m pretty sure I look like I don’t have any blood left in my head. “Um, yes.”
“Why’d you ask that, kiddo?” Ava ruffles his hair.
“Nan said she thinks a lady wants to kiss daddy.” He grimaces and adds with a whisper. “On thewips.”
“And this right here is why I love babysitting my brother’s child.” Ava props her chin on her fists. “Charlie man, tell me what lady wants to kiss your daddy on the lips.”
“The one at the station.”
“Oh-ho, the new receptionist?”
I hide my smile behind another drink. This is a glimpse at the old Ava, always looking for dirt to hold over her brother’s head.
He grimaces again. “Nan says she isn’t nice.”
“Nana said that?”
“To Pops.” Charlie leans forward as if he might share a secret. “They didn’t know I could hear ‘em.”
“You sneak.” Ava tickles his neck.
Once he stops giggling he goes on, “Nan said the lady asked what days I went to see my mom.” He scoffs. “I tan’t go to heaven.”
This kid . . . I think I’d be content to hang out with him all the time. Weird, since I don’t like to hang out with anyone. Besides Ava. And the guys. I can practically hear Griffin laughing at me as the realization that I might enjoy people more than I let on hits me in the chest.
“She probably didn’t know your mommy is an angel,” Ava says. “And she probably wanted to know what days she could hang out with you most.”
“Nah.” He shakes his head. “Nan said she wants daddy alone because she only wants one thing.”
“What thing?”
He shrugs. “Prob-ly his firetwuck.”
I can’t help it. The laugh takes me from behind, scraping up my throat and bursting out. I hide my face, shoulders shuddering. Ava elbows me, but she’s just as bad, trying to hide her own laugh behind a greasy piece of pizza.
