Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 91461 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 457(@200wpm)___ 366(@250wpm)___ 305(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91461 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 457(@200wpm)___ 366(@250wpm)___ 305(@300wpm)
“That doesn’t mean she’s off the hook for not talking to him,” I pointed out.
“I know, but I don’t want her to come stay with you and Dad. I want her there with us. The hive doesn’t work without the queen.”
“Awwww,” I said.
“That’s layin’ it on a bit thick, isn’t it?” Sam told him.
Kola hugged me and then walked over and leaned into his father. Sam stopped teasing him and just held his son, and I was thinking that they both needed that.
Four hours later, I was not at all surprised when the back door opened, but I was when Jake, and not Hannah, arrived in the living room, where Sam and I were watching MobLand. Or technically he was rewatching it and I was watching it for the first time.
“Hi,” Sam greeted him, having paused the show. “What’s going on?”
“Is it okay?”
“Is what okay?”
“If I stay here?”
“Of course,” Sam told him. “Never ask, just show up.”
Jake looked away quickly, scrubbed at his eyes, that were already red, and then looked back. “Okay, then. I’m gonna go put my stuff in the guest room and––”
“It’s your room,” Sam told him. “The only difference between now and when you were in there is that there’s a new mattress that’s not so ridiculously soft that you sink in, and your socks aren’t on the floor.”
Quick smile from him as the tears rolled down his face.
I couldn’t take it.
Rising off the couch, where I was snuggled into Sam’s side, I walked over, reached up, and wrapped my arms around his neck. I hugged him tight, and I heard first his duffel and then his garment bag hit the floor before I was squeezed back. After me, Sam, who had joined us, embraced him and then helped him carry up his stuff and made one more trip to the car for a hamper full of dirty clothes and a laundry basket full of things like his shampoo and conditioner, the stuff he put on his face, and other assorted items.
“Are you hungry?” I asked him.
He nodded.
Sam and I sat with him, and Jake explained that he had appreciated that Hannah was going to give him some space, but when he returned home, Kola immediately wanted to explain Hannah’s point of view more thoroughly so Jake could understand precisely what was going through her mind.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” he told us. “And I definitely don’t want to talk to Kola about it when he’s doing the thing where he’s insisting that I agree with him.”
“Well, just stay here,” Sam told him. “Maybe take a shower and go to bed after you eat. You need to rest, because you look terrible.”
There was no way he’d gotten any sleep, not looking at the bags under his eyes.
“I drove out to Wisconsin to spend Father’s Day with my dad, and it was good, you know? We talked, and I was going to ask if I could stay there for the summer and work with him, but I think I’m all right visiting, but not being there with him and his wife and their girls for an extended period.”
“So you’ve been back?”
“Yeah, I’ve been staying with different friends, but after Kola and I talked earlier and he left, I packed and got outta there.”
“Staying with friends was dumb,” Sam told him. “You should have come home immediately.”
Jake nodded.
“It’s fine, you did what you felt you needed to, but you’ll stay here now, and that’s settled. You know we love you.”
“It’s true, kid,” Sam said gruffly, putting his hand on his cheek and patting him gently. “You’re ours too. And that doesn’t change, no matter what.”
More tears in his big blue eyes, and I got up and hugged him, then patted his back before heating up the enchiladas Sam was going to take for lunch the next day. Jake remained a bottomless pit.
Once he staggered up the stairs and I started on the dishes, my husband grabbed a hand towel and took his place beside me at the sink.
“I wanted those,” he told me.
“There are food trucks right outside your office,” I reminded him.
“It’s not the same,” he muttered as his cell rang. It was Hannah, and he put it on speaker.
“Hi, Daddy,” she greeted him. “So I’m going to stay home, the boys want me here, and Jake and I will just have to––”
“He’s over here, bunny,” I told her. “If you check your room, you’ll see his stuff is gone.”
“He—what?”
“What’s wrong?” Kola asked us.
“Nothing’s wrong,” I replied. “I was just telling your sister that Jake is over here with us.”
“Kola?” I heard Finn call. “Jake’s coffee mug isn’t with the rest of ours on the counter. Do you know where it is? Nobody washed the bio-hazard, did they?”
As I glanced to the left, I saw it there on the counter, the heavy sixteen-ounce porcelain mug, cream-colored with brown speckles, that I was fairly certain was indestructible, as many times as Jake had dropped it. Sam had brought it back from New York for him years ago, and it was emblazoned with only Jakey. The inside was stained, seasoned, Jake insisted, to perfection. How I felt about my cast-iron frying pan, Jake felt about his mug. That he had fled, and made sure to bring it along, let me know this would not be a quick over and done. He was figuring out his whole life at the moment.