CHAPTER ELEVEN
I take my laptop into my home office, forcing myself not to glance at Dev still sitting in the family room as I walk by. I’m hoping he’ll take the hint, pack up his stuff, and leave. There’ve been too many awkward moments between us, and I’m worried that the longer he stays, the more I’m going to continue trying to find ulterior motives on his part for being here.
It’s a simple enough task to put my laptop down on the desk and plug in the cords that are waiting. I bring up the Internet and stare at a blank page. The search engine window is calling out to me, asking me what I want to do, where I want to go, and what I want to look for.
I’m trying to ignore the rustling sounds I hear in the other room, assuming it’s Dev getting the pizzas together so he can take them home. I should be happy that he’s following my instructions to leave, but I’m not. He’s such a nice guy, and he seems like a dedicated dad. Maybe even a good dad, a rare beast in my world. Like the amur leopard. One day I will do the dating thing again. It’s not going to happen with him, obviously, but it will happen. I don’t plan on dying an old maid.
The search window is staring at me. I could go on one of those dating websites. Check it out . . .
The minute the thought flows through my head, I can feel my face starting to burn. No, that would be silly. I’m not dating material right now. I’m too newly divorced. Too . . . mothery.
Instead, I go on one of the freelance sites I’ve heard about from my coworkers. Apparently I can put up a profile that lists all my skills, and anybody looking for a freelancer like me could find me.
I go to the website for a look but all it does is depress me. I already have so much stuff I have to get done at my current company, I can hardly keep up. Sammy was sick last week, and I missed an entire day of work because the daycare wouldn’t take him, so now I have to do all the things that I missed in half the time. They run a very short-staffed operation there, so there’s no hope of anyone helping me out.
Nope, I can’t take more work onto my shoulders. My kids would never see me. Not that they’d mind, probably, because while the cat is away the mice definitely play in this house. The last time I left them to their own devices and tried to do some work at home, the girls covered Sammy in greasy diaper rash ointment and then topped it off with talcum powder. They said they wanted to make him look like a ghost to practice their Halloween costumes. He looked like a ghost for the entire two hours it took me to wash it all off of him. That stuff sticks like nobody’s business, and its base is fish oil, so our bathroom and a couple of our towels still smell like anchovies.
I’m always torn when I catch the kids doing things like this. I can’t decide if it’s sibling love and the girls inviting Sammy to be a part of their games, or sibling torture with him as the easiest victim. I’ve fallen back on the theory that if it were the more vicious type of play, Sammy would let me know, and he never seems to mind, so I don’t get too upset about it. Besides, they did do a really fantastic job of covering every square inch of his skin. If he decides he wants to go out on Halloween as a ghost, I’ve got the costume part covered.
That’s a whole other thing I have to deal with. Halloween is just weeks away, and the kids are already harassing me about costumes. I jump on my keyboard and do a quick search on Amazon for potential ideas. There are at least fifty pages of options, so I close the window down and take a breath. Maybe I could get them to go as the Three Stooges. It would fit my life pretty perfectly. I write on a little notepad next to my computer to remind myself to ask the kids what they want to be so I can get the costumes in time.
I put the pen down and, once again, find myself staring at my search engine window. Where do I want to go from here?
A door opens and closes somewhere out beyond my office, interrupting my train of thought. I’m sad that Dev is gone, but I can hardly complain, since I’m the one who asked him to leave. I totally and completely suck at interacting with the opposite sex.
I bite my lip as I stare at the computer. It’s nuts that a near stranger leaving my house makes me so sad. Crazy. I seriously need to get a life.
It’s that thought that sparks my inspiration. I could go on a dating website. It doesn’t mean that I’m actually going to look for a date. Browsing is not the same as being desperate for a man. I could just see what’s out there, right?