CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Chloe
A doorknob turned. Footsteps. My eyes snapped open. I was a little groggy, but apart from that, I was fine. No pounding head, no need to puke. “Hey.” Josh was next to the bed, looking down at me with a huge grin on his face. “Morning, Chucky.”
“Chucky?” I took the glass of water and aspirins from his hands and downed them both.
“Yeah. You know . . . because of all the times you chucked last night.”
“Oh.” Heat crept into my cheeks. “I’m sorry.”
He shrugged. “All good. Made me feel like a kid again. Come out when you’re ready. I have someone I want you to meet.” He started to walk out of his room. “I set some clothes at the end of the bed. I didn’t think it was appropriate for me to strip you down and change you last night.”
“Fair point.”
“Yeah. And Hunter would probably kick my ass,” he said, before closing the door behind him.
After showering and putting on the sweats and shirt Josh had set out, I made my way to the living room. Tommy was on the floor, playing with blocks, while Josh was in the kitchen. Blake was nowhere to be seen.
“So you must be the famous Tommy I’ve heard all about.” I got down on my knees and watched as he stacked one block on top of the other. “Josh, how old is Tommy?”
He came out of the kitchen with two coffees in hand. I’d never been so happy to see coffee in my life. “Nine months and three days, why?”
I stood up and accepted the coffee but kept my eyes on Tommy. “How long has he been sitting up for?”
“Twenty-six days,” he said proudly, motioning with his head to the sofa. He waited for me to seat myself before taking the spot next to me. “Why?”
“Dude. Your kid’s a genius. Stacking normally comes at around fifteen months.”
“Yeah?”
I nodded.
“Huh.” He looked down at Tommy, but his smile faded. “Who would’ve thought two high school dropouts could produce something like that?” There was sadness in his voice, completely separate from the boy in the bowling alley or the boy that talked shit and got high.
“Josh?”
His gaze slowly moved from Tommy to me.
“You know what you’re doing is beyond extraordinary, right? You’re a great dad—and an amazing person. You gave up your chance at being an irresponsible kid and took all of this on . . . and you did it on your own.”
“He’s my son.” He shrugged. “There was no question. It wasn’t like I had a choice.”
“You’re wrong.”
His eyes narrowed.
“There were a lot of choices, Josh. You could’ve given him up for adoption. You could’ve handed him over to his grandparents. You could’ve not had him at all. You could have just walked away. But you did none of those things. You went from being a kid to a man overnight. No one forced you to do it. You chose to. And I see how proud you are of him, and he’s going to know that. When he’s older, he’s going to see that.”
His eyes glazed over as they went back to watching Tommy.
“He’s going to grow up knowing that. And when he’s old enough to understand—when he knows about your struggles and everything that you gave up for him—he’ll be proud of you, too. And you should be—you should be proud of yourself.”
He sniffed once, his eyes still trained on Tommy. I knew he was trying to hold back, but it was clear he needed to hear these words, because maybe no one had ever told him before. Maybe he had never realized the impact he had on other people, not just me. And not just by his actions but also by the type of person he was. “You made that choice, Josh. Whether you realize it or not. You chose to stand up—to be the strength that you and Tommy need. And Tommy’s mom . . . She’s going to regret it—”
He sniffed again and wiped his eyes on his forearm.
“She’s going to regret missing out on this. Not just Tommy. But you, too. I’m sure she already does.”
He cleared his throat with a grunt and used his palms to rub his eyes. He inhaled a few calming breaths before turning his gaze back on me. “And what about you?” he asked.
I looked back to Tommy, his little eyes so concentrated on the blocks in front of him. “What about me?”
“I think you should give Blake a chance. He cares about you.”
My gaze dropped to floor.
“He shouldn’t,” I whispered.
“Chloe,” he said quietly, tapping on my arm. I refused to look up. “If you don’t care about him like that, then you need to tell him. It’ll ruin him, but you need to be honest with him.”
At his words, a piece of me shattered. All my self-control, the walls I had built, all of it—broken. I felt the tears prick behind my eyes, but I held them back and faced him.
Truth time.
“It’ll be nothing like the hurt I cause him if I let him in, Josh.”
He cleared his throat. “I’m sorry,” he said, “but I don’t understand what you’re saying.”
So I told him.
I told him about the cancer. My mom and my aunt. I told him about foster care and Clayton. I told him about the chances. I told him everything. He listened to every word, without interrupting me.
“I’m scared,” I continued. “I’m scared that if I let anyone in and I die . . . I’m gonna hurt them when I leave them behind. And I don’t want to cause that type of pain for anyone. My foster parents, and brothers and sister, and Blake . . . especially Blake . . . because I think I care about him the most.”
He nodded slowly. “So you just take off? Not form friendships? Relationships?”
“Yes.”
His eyes narrowed as he searched my face. “I get that, Chloe. I really do.” He cleared his throat. “It’s not the same. But I feel like that sometimes. I mean, having Tommy, that’s a lifelong commitment. If I ever want a relationship, I have to make the right choices, not just for me but for him, too. If I ever do end up meeting someone, they need to know that Tommy will always come first. Forever.” He paused and stared off into the distance. “But you and Blake are completely different.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, you as a kid, you lost your mom and your aunt, and I’m sorry for that, but you had no choice. They were your family, and you were a kid. Blake—he’s old enough to make his own decisions. If he wants to spend time with you—that’s his choice. But you have to let him make it.”
The front door swung open, and Blake stood motionless, box of diapers in one hand and formula in the other. “Hey,” he said, his gaze moving between Josh and me, before finally settling on me. “Are you ready to go home?”
I nodded.
Blake
“Are you okay?” I asked her once we were in the car.
“Yeah,” she said through a sigh. “I’m just a little embarrassed.”
“Why?”
“Just the way I was last night, and the way you saw me, and the way I acted.”
“It’s okay. I get it,” I told her. “Listen, I know that you have a shitload to deal with. More than any eighteen-year-old should ever have to. And tell me to fuck off if I’m overstepping, but next time you feel like you need to lose yourself—going out, getting beyond wasted . . . screwing around with guys—I dunno.” I shook my head slowly. “I just worry that it’s dangerous. I know that you don’t want people close, but that’s happened. People care. People worry. It’s not just you that behavior affects. If you feel like that again, you can come to me or Josh. We’ll always be here, but if you wait until it’s too late, like it was last—”
“Okay,” she interrupted. “I get it, Blake. I promise.”
When I pulled into the driveway, Sammy and Amy were there playing skateball. Even after last night’s events, I found myself smiling.
Sammy ran to the car. “Blake’s here!” he screamed.
I wound down my window and returned his fist bump. “Hey, bud. Who’s winning?”
“Amy.” He rolled his eyes. “But I think she’s cheating because she can count to eleventy-three. I can only count to twelve.” Then his eyes went huge. “Wait here,” he said excitedly. “Don’t go anywhere okay? Just wait right here.”
“Okay.”
“Promise? Say you promise,” he said, a seriousness consuming his little four-year-old face.
“I promise, bud. I’m not going anywhere.”
He grinned and ran up the porch steps. “Amy! Let’s show Blake what we got.”
I turned to Chloe. “What’s up with Sammy? He got a little intense there for a second.”
“Yeah. He has a fear of people leaving him. His parents left him at a movie theater. They said they were going to get popcorn and never came back.”
“Who the fuck—?”
“I know. The world is full of fucked-up people, Blake. But you can’t let it change your perspective on life.”
Sammy and Amy came barreling down the steps, wearing matching basketball jerseys.
“Is that our school jersey?” Chloe asked.
“I still don’t understand how you don’t know these things.”
“Look!” Sammy yelled, stopping in front of the car. He waited for Amy to stand next to him. “Ready?” he asked me.
“Go for it!”
Sammy grinned from ear to ear. “One. Two. Six.”
Then they both spun around to show me the back of their jerseys.
Hunter 23.
“Holy shit.”
Chloe smiled and squeezed my hand. “Maybe you should remember this next time you think that shooting a ball through a hoop doesn’t serve a purpose.”