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There were a few pictures of her throughout different parts of the house I’d been in—Rhys’s room and the family room—proving her existence along with the ring on Banks’s finger, but she didn’t seem to be around ever. I started to wonder what kind of job the woman worked that she hadn’t been around to meet the woman who’d be caring for her son.
It was all so strange.
Maybe she was some celebrity that worked long stretches of time on a movie set or something.
No.
No, that wasn’t it, because I’d seen pictures of her, and I didn’t recognize her.
It was entirely possible Banks and his wife were separated and heading for a divorce. But if that was the case, would he still be wearing a wedding band?
I glanced down at my own left hand, saw my engagement ring sitting there, and realized just how much of a hypocrite I was being. If I was still wearing an engagement ring Graham had given me when there was no possible chance of me getting married to him now that he was dead, who was I to judge Banks for continuing to wear a ring after a separation from his wife.
But even if they were on the brink of divorce, I stillthought they’d come together to make decisions related to their son’s well-being. Wasn’t the fact that I was caring for him for several hours a day something his mother would want to be involved in?
At this point, it was all just speculation, and I could have been wrong about everything. I’d spent so much time thinking about something that clearly wasn’t an issue for Banks or Rhys that I lost track of time.
Fortunately, Rhys was right on schedule and started stirring. I didn’t immediately run upstairs to snatch him out of the crib. Instead, I watched him on the monitor for a few minutes, wanting to give him some time to wake up. After giving him that time, loving listening to the sounds of him jabbering on and on, I grabbed my phone off the cushion beside me and climbed the stairs.
When I walked in, I moved to the crib and asked, “Did you sleep good?”
Rhys continued making his baby noises while he happily kicked his legs.
“Tell me more,” I urged him, leaning over the edge of the crib and just watching him.
He didn’t disappoint.
A few seconds later, I decided this was the perfect moment. I pulled up the camera on my phone and snapped a still shot before I switched it to the video setting.
As soon as I pushed the button to start recording, I said, “Okay, Rhys. Now, you can tell your daddy and your grandma all about your dream.”
Continuing to kick his legs while he waved his arms around, Rhys shared, in his own special way, all the details of his dream.
I sent off two separate text messages—one to Robin and one to Banks—with a single line caption for each ofthem. In Robin’s, I’d simply indicated that I hoped that little video would make her morning after coming out of surgery. I didn’t expect she’d respond anytime soon, but that didn’t matter. I merely wanted her to be able to have something to make her smile when she got out of surgery.
The text to Banks was a bit different. He still got the video, but my goal was to make sure he knew that everything was okay at the house.
Lamise
Just woke up from his nap, and he’s happy as a clam.
I hadn’t expected a response so quickly, but no sooner had I slipped my phone back into my pocket, lifted Rhys in my arms, and moved him to the changing table to put a fresh diaper on him, my phone chimed.
I set Rhys down, pulled out the phone, and smiled at what I saw on the screen.
Banks
I love that kid so much.
Sliding the phone back into my pocket, I focused all of my attention on Rhys again.
After giving him a bottle, we got back to playing. And though it was a couple of hours, it felt like a matter of minutes. Before I knew it, we were sitting down to have lunch. Only after his face was nice and messy did I pull out my phone to snap another picture.
“What do you think, Rhys? Does your dad encourage messes, or is he a bit of a neat freak?”
Rhys was entirely too focused on eating to give me any answers. I figured I’d get an answer when I sent the sillypicture off to Banks with a short text indicating it was lunchtime.
Sure enough, Rhys had barely managed to get another bite of food before my phone chimed on the table.
