Sizzling Hot Apple Cider

by Jaliza A. Burwell

  “Honey Bunches and Oats?” I asked in a soft voice.

  They blinked and finally gave me their attention. At that point, I was almost desperate for it.

  “What’s going on?” I ask. “Did you not have fun today? Did someone bully you? Are you feeling sick? How are your tummies?”

  “I feel fine,” Lawson said.

  Lee nodded.

  “So why so sad?” I was going to get to the bottom of this.

  “Today, we got to see so many moms and dads.” Lee looked away and blinked as tears filled his eyes. “But we didn’t get to see our mama.”

  And they had no clue who their dad was. No one did.

  “And they talked about no school and all the plans they had with their parents,” Lawson said.

  And they wouldn’t have any with their mom. They only had me.

  “Do you feel lonely?” I asked.

  The two of them nodded.

  I bit my lip. “Kenni is coming over tomorrow to help bake. Will that help?”

  They shrugged.

  “And on Thanksgiving, Dayton and his friends are going to eat with us. Will that help?”

  That got their attention. I smiled.

  “And I’ll still be there. I know I can’t replace your mama, but maybe I can help take some of that loneliness away? I know we always celebrated together. You guys have always been there when I felt lonely, so maybe…” I blew out a breath, having trouble breathing through the words. “Maybe, I can help take some of that loneliness away for you guys this time?”

  “You felt lonely?”

  I nodded. “For a very long time. Your mama helped me when I did. And after you were born, you guys did too. I mean, you slept so much, but just holding you while you slept your life away helped me feel a lot better. Can I help you this time?”

  Lawson glanced at Lee. Lee stared at me for a long moment, working through what I was telling them. Finally, he nodded. “We can help each other,” he said.

  I smiled. “How about we start with snuggles?” I asked. “Come sleep in my bed with me for tonight? Then tomorrow, Kenni will be here and we can blast music and have dance parties. See if we can get Kenni singing.”

  Lawson laughed, finally smiling for the first time since their recital. “She’s not good at singing.”

  Grinning, I said, “I know. That’s what makes it so fun.”

  That got them breaking out into a fit of giggles. Success.

  After getting ready for bed, we all piled into my bed, the two of them curled into my side. I dozed briefly and woke with a start, my heart pounding hard.

  My nightmare sat at the forefront of my brain, my ears twitching for noise. All I could hear was the thrumming of my heart. I shifted in bed until I could wrap my arms around both of them.

  Normally, they’d curl more into me, but they didn’t move. I frowned, my heart rate picking up. Only after I rested my hand on their chests to feel them move did I relax. They were still breathing.

  Good.

  We had pillows galore in here, so I had to move them around so I was comfortable enough to hold the two of them close to me.

  “Sissy?” Lee called out in a quiet voice.

  “Go back to bed,” I whispered.

  “You’re here?” Still half asleep, his words came out slurred. He pushed into my side, his little arm wrapping around my stomach.

  I peeked at Lawson, who didn’t stir at all.

  “Yes, Honey Bunches, I’m still here.”

  His arms tightened around me, as if he were afraid I’d slip through his fingers. “You’re not going anywhere, right? You’ll always be here, right?”

  My heart ached at his vulnerable words. I didn’t want to promise something like that because life was cruel. I knew all too well how easy it was for a parent to be there and then gone the next minute. I lived it. And he knew too.

  “Yes,” I croaked out. “I’ll still be here. Always.”

  He snuggled back down, and moments later, his breathing evened out again and softened.

  My resolve hardened.

  Yes, for as long as I could be, I was staying by their side.

  Chapter Eighteen

  I slipped out of bed bright and early, the sun barely beating me.

  “I got this,” I said, digging through the cupboards, careful of pots banging against each other. Being as quiet as a mouse was key to my success. “Today will be a good day. Today will be fun.”

  After yesterday, we needed it. An hour later, the apartment was filled with the smell of bacon, and everything was as perfect as could be, considering I was the chef.

  “What are you making?” Lee asked, coming out, rubbing his face as he tried to wake himself up.

  “Breakfast,” I said.

  He frowned and blinked against the bright light. “Did you burn it?”

  “Nope. Not even close.”

  Lee knew me too well. He definitely didn’t believe me. But that was okay, I’d prove him wrong soon enough.

  “Can you set the table?”

  “Mhm.” While he slowly worked, I finished up the eggs and sausages. I made our plates while Lee went to drag Lawson out of the bed. If I let that boy sleep, the day would end before he bothered to come out. Normally, when he did that, he also grew a few inches.

  I shuddered at that thought. No more growing. They weren’t allowed.

  Unfortunately, no matter how many times I told them to stop, they didn’t listen. In fact, I think they made it a race. Lee would sprout, then Lawson soon followed, refusing to be the shorter one.

  “So are you ready for today?”

  “What’s today?” Lawson asked.

  “Today we bake!” I grinned. “Kenni will be over, and she’s going to help us make pies, some cookies, side dishes for tomorrow. She’s also bringing over decorations to spruce up the place a bit.”

  “We get to dance?” Lee asked.

  I nodded.

  That brightened their day.

  By the time Kenni made it over, they were prepped and ready to bounce off the walls. I may or may not have given them a strong dose of sugar to get their energy levels up.

  “Well, don’t you guys look excited!” Kenni laughed as she came in with a suitcase trailing behind her.

  “Moving in?” I asked.

  She snorted and shook her head. “These are the decorations.”

  Kenni quickly took on the role of our drill sergeant, telling us exactly what to do and never to do anything extra. I thought that last bit was aimed at me when I tried to sweeten the pie filling a little more. One could never use too much sugar.

  Apparently, Kenni disagreed with me. Which was how I found myself in timeout in the living room, flipping through the channels to find a good holiday movie to watch. I settled on Hallmark movies with sappy love stories. Sometimes, we needed that simple, adorable love around the holidays to give us hope for our own happily ever after.

  “Lawson,” Kenni said, followed by laughter that had me sitting up straight. If there was laughter, I wanted to be there. So I jumped to my feet, not caring that Kenni had already kicked me out of the kitchen. I peeked over the counter to see Kenni wiping flour off her face, grinning wide.

  Lee and Lawson were holding in their giggles as they stared at her.

  “Oh, what did you do now?” I asked, going into the kitchen.

  Lawson managed to make a small hill of flour in front of him. I took in the clues as I walked over to him. Flour. White hands. A faint fog in the air as it settled. The splash of white on Kenni’s turquoise shirt.

  Kenni wasn’t amused, but she wasn’t angry either.

  The twins were shaking, about to burst into a fit of giggles.

  It all clicked and there was no way, in any world or realm or universe, that I’d stay out of it. So before Lawson could react. I swooped down, grabbed flour, and dumped it onto his head.

  He smacked the top of his head with his hands. “Sissy!”

  “Only making it fair,” I teased.

>   Particles smacked me in the face, and I sputtered as some of it got into my mouth. Flour did not taste good. It was so… bland.

  Lee laughed as I wiped my face.

  And that was how we all regressed into three-year-olds and threw food at each other. Well, flour and sugar. Kenni managed to save the salt before it ended up in someone’s eyes.

  Other than that, my apartment became a very messy battlefield.

  By the time we calmed down, I was on the ground, laughing, with Lawson on top of me. Lee had Kenni down. The two of them claimed victory.

  “I’m not cleaning this up,” I said after managing to get my laughter under control.

  “I think Lawson should since he started it.” Kenni had always been a wise one.

  “Oh! Good idea!”

  “No, that isn’t fair,” Lawson said.

  I grinned and poked his sides. “Then Lee can help you. Chop chop, get to work while I change.”

  Lawson puffed out his cheeks to look like a chipmunk, clearly not happy with me.

  I didn’t care. I was so not cleaning this mess up.

  “I’m lucky I brought extra clothes.” Kenni moved Lee off her. “I’m going to steal their bathroom.”

  “Good plan. You two start cleaning, we’re gonna go change. Then you can take a bath.” I eyed their hair and refused to think about what mine looked like if theirs looked like they were about to fade away into little ghosts. I was sure we all looked like a horror creature in the making.

  Without more instruction—because curious me wanted to see how’d they clean up the mess—I went into my bathroom.

  By the time I was done washing all the flour out of my hair, I wasn’t impressed with their attempt. They’d decided to use water, and had managed to create what amounted to a flour-mud pit in my kitchen.

  My poor floors.

  “What did my floors ever do to you?” I asked, staring down at the congealed flour.

  “We thought it’d work,” Lee said.

  “That definitely didn’t work,” Kenni said, coming out too, all freshly clean and beautiful. “Go get in the tub. I ran a bath for the two of you. Be quick or you’ll miss helping me make the mini pies.”

  The two of them exchanged a glance and made a dash for the bathroom, more excited about getting out of cleaning than having to take a bath. Lee stopped at the door and turned to us with a frown.

  “Sorry we made it worse.”

  I waved him off. “This is nothing to apologize about.”

  Lee looked placated with my response and disappeared into the bathroom, leaving it halfway open so we could hear them talking with each other.

  Kenni looked around the room and over into the living room, wincing. “This probably wasn’t the best idea.”

  “Psh. Don’t try to feel guilty now. You know you had fun.”

  She chuckled. “Yeah.”

  The twins could stay in the bath for hours if I let them, so after we finished cleaning, we settled onto the couch, the TV playing a movie already halfway over.

  “So?” Kenni’s arm rested on the back of the couch as she turned to me.

  “So?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Spill. Tell me all about them. I want every little detail.”

  “Oh my God. You want me to air my dirty laundry?”

  “I already know all about your dirty laundry. I want to hear more about these men that have found their way into your life. You’re not exactly a social butterfly, so this is all exciting.” She rubbed her hands together like she was preparing to dig deep into a story that was going to make international news.

  I dove in, ranting about the men and their current idiocy. She listened attentively. By the end, I was breathless from talking so much about so much.

  “You really kissed Bryce and Dayton?”

  “What? No! They kissed me. And Bryce only got my cheek. Dayton is a thief and stole one from me.”

  She grinned while my face grew hot.

  “Even though you turned them down, how did it really make you feel? Once you think you’re ready, would you pursue a relationship with one of them.” She wiggled her eyebrows. “Or all of them?”

  “Giddy. All three of them make me feel giddy, like the stars are in my hands and all I have to do is make a fist to catch them.” I eyed Kenni. “All three of them? Really?”

  Kenni shrugged. “I travel a lot, and that means I’ve seen relationships in all shapes and sizes. Would I want that? Definitely not. But you? Maybe. I never really thought about it before, but it seems like you’re in the perfect position to give it a whirl.”

  “That sounds so wrong.”

  “Love is love, and I think you know that better than most, even when you try to run from it. Look at Lawson and Lee. They’re your nephews, but you’ve gone above and beyond, taking them in as if you were the one who had to go through labor pains to have them. You already look at them as a mother would. Not their birth mom. You know you’ll never replace your sister, but you act like their mom, all overprotective and paranoid. If anyone can fall in love with three guys, it’s you.” Her smile was soft as she looked me over. “You have never been a conventional person.”

  “I can’t believe you’re talking about this.”

  “I’m only bringing it up because you’re already halfway there. I can see it. I’ve known you for a few years now, Maddie. You’re never this careful when it comes to the other sex. I’m surprised you lasted as long as you have with Felix, but I think part of that is because both of you kept it simple and easy. Fun. But the deep stuff, I bet you guys never talked about anything deep like marriage, kids, or even moving in together, or hell, getting a goldfish. He was all about fun with you. I mean look what happened when you took in the twins. He didn’t even try. He didn’t want that kind of responsibility.”

  I blew out a breath. Kenni always knew how to get straight to the point. Her words were leaving me feeling raw and vulnerable, and I didn’t like that. I was leaving myself open to getting hurt.

  “It doesn’t matter,” I said. “It all doesn’t matter. Dating three guys? That isn’t going to happen. Bryce and Dayton practically threw a fit when they found me in a hammock with Koen. And nothing had happened. We had a great night of talking and fell asleep like that.”

  “Maybe it’s impossible, or maybe you pull up your big girl panties and tell the guys what you want. Stop trying to hide behind your breakup with Felix. Frankly, he was more of a long-term friend with benefits rather than a boyfriend. But these guys? You care about them deeply. I can see it. You want them in your life.”

  “Exactly. In my life. Not running for the hills.”

  She stood up and stretched, her shirt rising up to above her bellybutton. “That’s your fear talking, Maddie. I said what I wanted to say, and I think you can get something out of approaching them about it, if it’s something you want. I can hear the boys. They’re getting out of the tub.”

  After what I called ‘Kenni’s Wise Words,’ she went back into the kitchen to prep for the boys to help her with the mini pies. I stayed where I was, trying to absorb her words.

  What she said sounded nice on paper, but there was so much more to it still. I had to figure out if something like that was even what I wanted. And the guys had to be game too.

  I didn’t see it working out at all. How was it fair?

  Me and three guys?

  That was just plain bonkers.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Kenni had managed to get most of the decorations up yesterday, so I was only topping it off. It involved glitter. Glitter was a must have for decorations, even if it was a pain to clean up.

  Totally worth it.

  I was also procrastinating. I knew I needed to get the turkey into the oven. Maybe? Actually, I wasn’t sure when I should put the turkey into the oven. I tried to use their formula for figuring out how long to cook it, and it went downhill from there.

  So I shoved glasses on the turkey, tossed it in the sink to ‘marinate,’ and let it
have a party while I got ready for my own.

  The twins were laughing at a kids’ show on the TV, and I left them to it. Better that way so they’d stay out of my way. It also kept them from noticing my lack of cooking. I was pretty sure at this point that I should technically have more done.

  An ache settled in my soul as I tried my best not to think about it. Mandy should have been here. She should have been the one cooking, having everything timed perfectly. This wasn’t something I could do by myself.

  This wasn’t my thing.

  I could hear it. Mandy in the kitchen, pots clanging, the air thick with the flavors of her dishes. Her voice as she sang Christmas songs. Mandy had been the type to start singing Christmas music as soon as Halloween was over. I glanced toward my kitchen, able to picture her there so easily. When the phantom of her figure disappeared and all there was left was an empty kitchen, it almost did me in.

  Mandy.

  Biting my lip, I went back to tossing around the fake leaves on the table. Decorating I could do. I knew how to do that. Maybe I could order Boston Market? Was there still time?

  The buzzer went off, giving me a small fright. I glanced at the clock and frowned. Were the guys here already? I didn’t expect them here until dinner time, when the food should already be done.

  Then they had no choice but to eat the tacos I had planned when cooking the turkey failed. Tacos I could make. That was easy. Burn the meat in the taco seasoning. Put all the fixings into individual bowls. Boom, done.

  “Yeah?” I asked over the intercom.

  “We’re here,” Dayton sang out, dragging out the words.

  “Great,” I lied. Could I get away with pretending the buzzer was broken like I did with my dad? I hit the button, the buzzing sound telling me it worked. Darn, maybe I didn’t hope enough?

  It took a few minutes for them to knock on my door. Frowning, I answered it, and then blinked in surprise. My mouth dropped open and words ran away from me.

  Finally, I gathered enough words to ask, “What is that?”

  Dayton, Koen, and Bryce were all grinning big as they huddled in the hallway holding on to a big bushy green tree. The scent of pine hit me, bringing along with it memories of Mandy, the twins, and us decorating our tree days before Christmas came.