“He’s tried to get her to understand. She’s digging in her heels.” I glanced at father and son. “It appears she’s still digging in her heels.”
“Some stay. Some go. So many go, the pool gets less populated. So I’ll pull out my crystal ball to confirm when I get home, but right now I can say with some authority in a year or three or five, or for the rest of her life, Hixon and you hang around Glossop, Shaw comes home to see you guys, and Wendy stays here, she’ll see him and she’ll be kickin’ her own ass. Especially after he lands a babe who’s smart enough not to give a man an ultimatum about something like that.”
“Mm,” I mumbled my agreement.
The conversation ended and both father and son walked up to sit with Lou and me.
Hix gave me a look and a short shake of his head.
I returned his look but gave a smile to Shaw.
He gave one back but it was one he didn’t commit to.
They sat.
Hix curved an arm around me.
We watched Corinne and Snow help the team beat the crap out of Yucca.
We then went home.
Shaw was barely in the back door when he muttered, “I’m gonna go out to Sunnydown and hang with Andy.”
Mamie had spent the game dancing under the bleachers with her friends. She’d already danced into the house. Corinne gave her brother a look, me a look, her dad a look but kept quiet and moved into the house.
Hix murmured, “That’s cool, kid. Call when you’re on your way back.”
I stood there allowing the glow of how much Shaw liked my brother to warm me.
Then I followed him out to the garage.
“Hey,” I called.
Standing at the door to get outside to his car parked in the drive, Shaw turned to me.
I got close. “She’s not the one.”
His mouth got tight. “I know, we’re young, it’s not the end of the world.” He looked away, mumbling, “Whatever.”
“It’s not that you’re young,” I stated and he looked back to me. “And it might not be the end of the world, but that doesn’t negate the fact that it feels like it right now. It’s that she’s not the one.”
I had his attention and since he didn’t say anything or cut the conversation off, I got closer and brushed my fingers along the back of his hand.
“She either believes in you and your dreams or she doesn’t. If she doesn’t, Shaw, honey, she’s not the one. She can be seventeen or she can be thirty-five. The woman you pick has to understand what you want out of life and she has to support that one hundred percent. It’s your job to give that back. What is not your job is to settle for anything less. You don’t make a man what he’s not. You find the man you want and stand beside him no matter what.”
“Yeah,” he whispered.
“Yeah,” I decreed.
“I liked her a lot,” he confided in me.
“I know that, sweetheart.”
“But you’re right. What you said. She’s not the one.”
I gave him a gentle smile. “You’ll find her, Shaw.”
He stared at me and he did it hard.
Then he said, “Yeah.”
I liked how he said that and what he didn’t hide he meant by it so my smile got less gentle and a lot bigger.
“Go see Andy,” I ordered.
“Should I take him candy bars?” he asked.
“If you want. Do you need money?” I asked back.
He shook his head. “I got it.”
“All right. Be safe, yes?”
“I will, Greta. Later.”
“Later, Shaw.”
He walked out the door.
I walked in the one that led to the mudroom only to see my man leaning a shoulder against the jamb of the doorway to the hall with his arms and ankles crossed, waiting for my return.
Seriously.
My man was hot.
“You sort him out?” he asked.
And seriously.
My man was a good dad.
“I gave him a few things to think about.”
“Good,” he murmured. Then asked, “You gonna make dinner or am I takin’ my girls out to eat?”
“Mamie’s on a cooking binge. When she’s not pirouetting, she all about spices. I promised to demonstrate the art of making tacos tonight, this art including not worrying about spices too much since McCormick does it for you. She’s looking forward to it.”
“Tacos sound good.”
He said that but he didn’t move.
“You gonna get out of my way so I can get your girl and convene my lesson at the Drake Culinary School?” I asked.
He lifted one shoulder. “Sure, you earn passage with a kiss.”
I could totally do that.
So I did it.
Then I taught Mamie how to make tacos.
And at the dining room table we were selling when I closed on my house in two weeks, Hix’s girls with Hix ate them.
I walked into our bedroom.
Hix, sitting on the edge of the bed, elbows to his knees, one hand clamped on the back of his neck, didn’t move.
This was not a pose that alarmed me.
Shaw had graduated three hours before.
My heart lurched, I closed the door, went and sat next to my man.
I pressed up against his side, wrapping my arm around his back and resting my forehead to his shoulder.
He cleared his throat but didn’t lift his head when he said gruffly, “Kid’s smarter than me and I’m a forty-two year old man.”
I wasn’t sure that was true but I didn’t disagree verbally.
I just hummed, “Mm.”
“He’ll be okay.”
I agreed with that. “He will.”
“He’ll do good.”
“Yes, he will.”
“Find a good woman. Build a good life.”
“Yes.”
“Hear him cryin’.”
That confused me. Shaw was out partying with his friends. He was amped. Hix had hidden all of this as best he could, Hope had done her part with that too, so it was all good for Shaw.
“What?”
He lifted up, turned to me, and I saw the red rimming his eyes.
Oh, my Hix.
“Came out bawling. Didn’t even have to induce it. He let it be known he was a part of this world the minute he slipped out. Keep hearin’ that. Hearin’ the memory of that moment my boy became mine.”
I pressed closer to him and rounded him with both arms.
“What happened to my baby boy?” he whispered.
I’d barely got my arms around him, but at that, I put both hands to his cheeks and my face in his.
“He grew up, Hixon,” I whispered back. “And you did good, baby. You and Hope did so good with him. He’s amazing. Simply amazing.”
He sniffed and sat straight.
My hands fell away.
“Andy’s a mess,” he declared.
I nodded.
It was far from lost on Andy that his new best friend was soon to enter the marines. He loved Hix. He adored Mamie and Corinne. But he’d bonded with Shaw.
“I know. I’ll go to him in a second, see if he’s okay. Just wanted to make sure you’re okay.”
“He goes to basic in three weeks.”
“Yes,” I said.
“We’re gonna make that a great fuckin’ three weeks.”
I smiled weakly at him.
He took my hand and stood, pulling me up with him.
He let me go instantly and I let him do it when he stated toward the door, “I’ll go to Andy.”
“Okay, darlin’.”
He looked down at me.
“Love you,” I whispered.
He bent and touched his lips to mine.
Then, while Shaw partied with his friends, the girls were with their mom looking after her, my man went to my brother so they could commiserate about the upcoming loss of their boy.