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“Opa?” Gunner asked. “Isn’t that German for Grandpa?”
She laughed. “It’s how Mona said my name when she was learning to talk, and it sort of stuck.”
Gunner smiled. Opa. So his wife had the unsexiest nickname on the planet. Okay. He stood. “Why don’t you and Opa both go watch TV with Gabby? I can clean up tonight.”
Nova jumped up so fast that Mona started to slide down her body, but she caught her before she crashed into the tabletop. “Not so fast,” she said to Gunner and then spun toward the living room.
Gunner hurried to clear as much of the table as he could before she got back, but she was faster than she looked. He turned toward the sink, and she grabbed two plates out of his hands like an aggressive pickpocket.
He started to fill the sink with hot water. “I can buy you a dishwasher if you want.”
“No, that’s okay.”
Maybe it was, but he was going to buy her one anyway. He didn’t want the first words he heard in heaven to be his mother scolding, “Why didn’t you buy your wife a dishwasher?”
“I’m so exhausted that I feel like I’m drunk.”
He didn’t know what to say to that. He wanted to tell her that she could go straight to bed right now, but he didn’t know where that was going to happen.
The hot water felt good on his hands and made him even more tired. “I’ll wash, you dry.”
“Fine, but I really can do the dishes by myself.”
“Don’t worry. I plan to let you for the next forty years. This is your honeymoon, so I thought I’d help.”
She laughed. “I thought we were going to take a family vacation for a honeymoon?”
Oh yeah. He’d forgotten about that conversation. He swayed to the side so his hip bumped into hers. “Who says I can’t give my wife more than one honeymoon?” Besides, he wasn’t much of a traveler. He’d just as soon have his honeymoon in his house.
They washed and dried in silence for a few minutes, and he marveled at how he still enjoyed her company even when basically nothing was happening. He finished washing the last dish and then grabbed a second towel to help her finish drying.
When she slid the last plate into the cupboard, she said, “I’m going to go tuck the kids in.”
“Okay. Tell them we can wash their bedding tomorrow.”
She chuckled tiredly. “I promise that they won’t even notice.”
Chapter 34
Mona was so tired that she wasn’t even making sense. Nova pretended to understand what she was trying to say and then kissed her on the forehead and stood to go. Mona promptly burst into tears. Feeling like she might crash and burn any second now, Nova sat on the edge of her bed again, and Mona stopped crying immediately.
Well, that was a neat trick. “What is it, honey?”
“Stay with me,” she said, her words smashing together into one long one.
Nova didn’t know what to do. She didn’t mind staying here with her, and it was certainly a safe way out of the conundrum she had been trying not to think about for the last six hours. But it wasn’t fair to Gunner, and she didn’t want to use Mona as an excuse. “I have to go to my bed,” she said even though she didn’t quite know where that bed was.
“No!” she wailed.
That time she had heard real fear in her voice, and now she really didn’t want to leave her. Mona had been through so much. Had she cried for Opa or for her mother these last few nights when neither of them could hear her? The idea broke Nova’s heart. She leaned closer to Mona. “I need to go talk to Gunner, okay? Then I’ll come right back.”
Mona’s expression froze for a second as she considered this, but when Nova stood to go, Mona screamed again and grabbed her sleeve like a tiny vice.
Nova sat, paralyzed by indecision. She didn’t want to offend or annoy Gunner, but she couldn’t leave Mona like this either.
Gunner appeared in the doorway. “Is she okay?”
Nova didn’t know how to answer that. She stood again, and again Mona screamed and grabbed hold of her arm. She sounded like someone was trying to kill her, and her grip was so tight that it hurt Nova’s skin.
