“I m-missed you, too. Now shut up before I really start to cry.” She leans forward, expecting I’ll catch her in my arms and hold her. And of course I will. It’s all I’ve wanted to do since the last time I’d touched her.
My arms wrap around her shoulders, despite the mass of her stomach getting between us, I hold her to me and marvel that she still fits in my arms like we were molded for one another. She squeezes back, maybe harder than she intends to. I hold her close and wonder if maybe that last salt water kiss all those months ago wasn’t really the last time I’ll have kissed her. God, I hope not.
“Tell me what we’re having?” I ought to brace myself for impact, because no matter what she says, my life is bound to change in one more way. It ought to scare me, just the tiniest bit. Instead I welcome it as thoroughly as I welcomed her into my arms.
She grins up at me, the exact sort of gorgeous smile I never thought I’d see her shine in my direction again. It slays me just like it always has. When she stands on her tiptoes and whispers three words in my ear, my face nearly splits in two.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
It’s an unseasonably warm day. They happen in Colorado from time to time, but February is a strange time for one this warm. If I had the time or energy to go for a jog, I might have seen people in t-shirts, maybe even having picnic lunches or trying to use the grill pits in the park. A day like today usually means only one thing—another snowstorm is coming up. It’s been a dark, snowy winter, and I’ve loved every second of it. The storm is coming, though, and it might just be a dusting or maybe one that’ll shut the state down, like we had around Christmastime. But more than likely, tomorrow won’t be a day to sit out on this little balcony of mine with my vapor pen (I still don’t like the thing, still miss my regular cigarettes—but it’s better for Juliana and the baby this way) and a cup of strong coffee. Tomorrow Mama A and my mom and a myriad of siblings will be tucked into their own snowed-in houses instead of here. Today is a good day to sit and enjoy, as long as I can.
I’m better off out of the way. Juliana ought to have some time with her family for a change—this place is closer to Constance’s place than Mama A’s, so it’s a drive for everyone else to get here. I swill back my now-almost-cold coffee and pull on the vapor pen—the juice could use a top-off.
When Anja steps out onto the balcony with me, she has a real cigarette in her hand. “Have anything I can use as an ashtray?”
“Here, this’ll work.” I hand her my almost-empty coffee cup, and she places it between her feet when she sits down next to me.
“I like this place,” she says, looking up at the house behind us. “It seems like it fits you guys.”
“Yeah, I like it, too.” I like that there’s a finished basement I can see my clients in once things are a little less hectic and I can actually get the space decorated. I like the jacuzzi tub in the master bathroom. I like that a townhouse kitchen, while neither big or luxurious, is at least bigger and more functional than an apartment galley kitchen. And I really, really like my view of the mountains, one of the perks of living on the west side of the city.
“I thought you were supposed to be quitting?” I ask her, nodding towards the cigarette that’s curling smoke around her face.
“I will when the stick turns blue,” she says with a shrug. I’m not going to judge her—smokers get it, even though I’m sure ardent non-smokers would be calling for her head.
We spend time enjoying what neither of us have been getting that all often—silence—and don’t talk about the things that are confusing. Like why Juliana and I are living together, but we aren’t together. And why she and Mattias are starting to get concerned that they’ve been trying to get pregnant for nearly a year, and still haven’t had any luck. I wonder if they’re jealous of me and Juliana, who didn’t even have to try. But then, we’re such a spectacular mess in comparison to their functionality that jealousy would be ridiculous. They’re together. They have each other. We’re still figuring us out.
“So I have something for you,” Anja says. She straightens her leg and buries her hand in her front pocket, but what she withdraws she keeps hidden in a tight fist. “I decided that you earned this, even if you’re still barely going to meetings.”
I hold out my open hand and she drops a tiny thing into the center of my palm. It catches the waning afternoon sun, and my breath catches in my throat.
It’s not just another aluminum chip—a one-year token is treated as a little more special than the ones handed out for the month milestones. It’s lacquered and sturdy, and the ‘1 year’ emblem glints in the waning sunlight.
“Anja… This is way too early. Way, way too early.”
“That’s the one I had for you last year. It’s not official, of course, since I’m not your sponsor anymore. Ryan’ll get another on the actual anniversary. But you’ve been trying so hard. You’ve been doing so well. Early or not, going to meetings or not, you’ve earned it.”
There’s a lump in my throat that’s almost impossible to swallow over. “Have I really?”
“After everything you’ve been through the last two years? All of it, and you’re here, sober, and have all of this…?” she says, holding her hands up for emphasis. “You could have spiraled out of control a hundred more times, but you haven’t. You’ve stayed sober. That’s an incredible achievement, Ez. I’m proud of you.”
I rub the token between my thumb and forefinger, and, for a second, miss the bumpy texture of the other chips under my skin. But my lips pull up into a smile and I reach across the space between the two chairs and grab Anja’s hand by the wrist so her cigarette doesn’t burn me. “Thank you. For this. And for not giving up on me.”
“I told you I’d never give up on you. And I meant it.”
“I know you did. But thank you again.”
I pop the token in my own front pocket and she shifts and moves her chair closer to mine. She loops her arm through the crook of my elbow and rests her head on my shoulder. She smokes a second cigarette as we stay there like that, silent and grateful. For a split second, it feels like we’re in high school again, even though those days couldn’t be farther away. And that’s probably best.
Mattias taps on the sliding glass door and pokes his head out. “Time to head out, baby. Anything else you need before we go, Ez?”
I shake my head and stand to give them both a proper hug. Lukas slips out with them, but it takes an extra few seconds to get my mother and Mama A on their way. I close and lock the front door behind them and draw the blinds, lest the setting sun on our western exposure blind Jules, collapsed as she is in the chaise.
I drop onto the footstool, pick her feet up, and set them in my lap. I pull on her toes and bury my knuckle in the arch of her left foot. She moans gratefully in response. “I seriously thought for a second we were going to have to move your stuff out of the second bedroom and move Mama in instead.”
“She’s just excited, that’s all. The novelty will wear off sooner or later, like it did for Gemma.”
“Comparing my fifty-something mother to your eight-year-old sister is hardly flattering.”
“Yeah, but it’s apt.”
“It is.” She chuckles.
God, I want to lean across and kiss her. It’s happened once or twice. Never passionate and lingering, just a brush of my lips against her cheek, her jaw, or the corner of her mouth. There’s more than enough pressure behind her lips that convinces me she wants more, she’d so happily take more if I gave it to her, but I still can’t. I always chicken out, back off, and just hold her instead. For now, this is all I can give her. Hence our things in the separate bedrooms, even if we’ve been innocently sharing a bed for the last several nights. Maybe I can give her more soon. Maybe it’ll still take a while. Add it to the list of things I still don’t know.
There are much bigger things we need to keep in mind, anyway.
She wiggles a throw pillow out from behind her back and stuffs it between her shoulder and h
ead. “Think I’ll wake up and have a horrible kink in my neck if I sleep right here?”
“How long do you really think you’ll end up sleeping for?” I say, my eyebrow raised.
“Touché.”
I knead her other foot while she dozes for a few minutes. I swipe my fingertips over her ankles before I push her feet off my lap entirely and stand. She whimpers at me, sounding more tired than pathetic.
“Just running upstairs for a minute. I’ll be back down in a second.”
“M’kay,” she says with a yawn. She smiles up at me wistfully when I lean down and peck the top of her head. It’s such a waste of a kiss when it could have found her mouth, but it’s still something.
In my room, I set the new token on top of my dresser next to my keys and the rest of my chips. Then, before I can think twice about it, I palm a few of the tokens, ones from earlier months well and truly behind me, and turn toe. I figure Jules is bound to have a box of envelopes in her desk. I know I don’t need to ask to take one, to borrow a pen from another drawer. Unless he’s moved, I remember Dylan’s address off the top of my head. Funny that would be something I’d remember when so many other things are lost in the drunken abyss of my memory, but there it is. I scrawl his name and address, but write only my return address in the top corner. He’ll probably recognize my handwriting, but maybe if he doesn’t see my name, he’ll give this a chance.
I should stuff a note in as well, but I have no idea what to write. An apology would be obvious, of course, but my apologies never seem to sit well with Dylan. And besides, it’s probably too little, too late. I don’t know if I want this, the spirit of this, to be a simple apology. I just want him to know I’m trying. Deep down, as fucked up as I am and I always will be, I’m trying so damn hard to get better. I’ll make it to a year sober this time, and hopefully, two, three, and the rest of my life. I still might slip up and have to start over somewhere along the line, and God help me if I do because I’ve got too much to lose by screwing up. That’s what I want Dylan to know.
Stuck on Juliana’s desk, propped under her lamp, are two different ultrasound stills. She had others taken in Sao Paolo before she came back, but I’d been there for these ones. We’ve decided to frame them, put them in a shadow box or something for posterity, but I feel like Jules would understand I need one of them for this. I slip the photo and my chips into the envelope, lick it closed, and hunt for a stamp.
I’m interrupted before I find one.
I pick my way down the stairs carefully, arms laden as they are, and smile when Jules looks up at me.
“Hi, baby,” Jules sing-songs. It’s the first time our daughter has been in my arms all day, so Jules doesn’t reach for her like she might otherwise. She’s at least gotten to feed her a couple of times in between the swooping, circling arms of her grandmothers and uncles. “Was she fussing?”
“Just a little. Fell asleep again when I picked her up, though.”
The baby sleeps astonishingly well, which means that we’ve gotten some rest here and there, too. We’re still not unpacked fully from moving into this place, since most of our time awake has been occupied with the baby instead of settling in. That’s why everyone was over just a bit ago—our bedrooms are finally unpacked and organized, the kitchen is stocked with food and clean dishes. It’s a home now, for us and for her. We can actually start getting into some sort of pattern, some sort of schedule, my family and I.
The word ‘family’ trips me up. I have a family, even though Jules and I are still walking this strange line together. But together, we have a baby. A daughter. And yeah, I’m probably being a typical bright-eyed, wrapped-around-a-little finger new dad to a baby girl when I say that she’s pretty much perfect. But she really is. She’s perfect, just like I’ve always believed her mother to be. Someday I’ll see her flaws as she grows and possibly becomes more like me than like Jules, but what I’ve realized about family is how deeply in love with them you always are, no matter their flaws. Maybe that’s why I hope Dylan will forgive me some day sooner rather than later—deep down, I’m sure my brother still loves me, even if he doesn’t like me.
“Scoot over?” I ask Jules. I pull the throw blanket off the back of the couch and hand it to her as she shifts to make room for me to settle down next to her. The baby shifts against my chest, making impossibly cute squeaking noises before she settles back and falls into an even deeper sleep. She’s soft and warm and has that crazy-addicting baby smell that just slays me. Jules curls her legs up into my lap and places her palm on the baby’s back. I tuck my free arm around Jules’s shoulder and pull her closer. Like the baby, she is asleep in a matter of seconds.
The living room gets vibrantly bright for a moment, then begins to dim as the sun disappears behind the mountains. A wind picks up outside. I assume it’s the first rush of cold air that’ll bring the clouds over the mountains down into the city. As if on cue, our heat kicks on with a gentle whoosh. White noise is almost as good as silence. And I like silence. It lets me think.
I wish Mac were here to meet his granddaughter. I’m sure he’d be crazy for her. I’m sure he’d be proud of me for rising to the occasion and not shying away. I’ll never be as good a dad to my daughter as he was to me, but damn it all if I’m not going to try.
In all likelihood, Dylan will scrawl ‘Return to Sender’ on the envelope with my chips and the ultrasound picture in it. It might take years for him to find out he has a niece, even longer for him to forgive me enough to ever know her. For all I know, he’s had or is expecting a kid himself. It’d be important to Mac if and when we both have kids that they know one another. That, eventually, we bury the hatchet and at least learn to be civil to one another. Maybe one day he’ll learn to forgive Constance, as I have. Maybe he’ll get to know Gemma and maybe we can all be a new family. I’m not holding my breath. But it’s a nice thing to hope for. I’m hopeful for a lot of things these days.
I wiggle one of my arms free and turn on the lamp next to me. Juliana shifts like she’s trying to block out the light, and I kiss her forehead at her hairline. One day, hopefully not so far off, there won’t be any more wasted kisses between us. I’m getting there. It’s a slow process. She’s patient, and I’m grateful. I want to do right by her. For both of these girls, curled up on me like I’m their rock, their everything.
Maybe I am. I’d like to think I am. I know for sure they’re my everything.
This is what I know: my name is Ezra Mackenzie. I turned twenty-seven last November. Last week, I held Juliana Almeida’s hand as our daughter entered the world.
And in that moment, she saved my life.
THE END
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I've been a writer ever since I could rub two words together, but it wasn't until I found a tribe of writers, readers, and fans in my little corner of the Internet that I really felt like the stories in my head might be worth telling. It was in that little corner that I found the incredible CPs—Diana Gallagher, Lindsey Ouimet, and Sarah May—who did so much to make this story better. My incredible early readers—Heather, Mandy, Jenn, Rike, and Any—cheered me on endlessly. Jennifer Ibarra, Natalia Jaster, and Stacey Lund were the first to make me brave. Elizabeth Da
vis, Megan Fowler, Kimberly Gardner, and Steph Kroll kept me brave. I wish I had the space and time to give the rest of you beautiful weirdos your entitled due, but in its place, please accept all my thanks and love.
Mary Cain, you are truly the best editor I could have ever hoped to work with, and I am so grateful every day you took a chance on me and my writing. Thank you will never be enough, and I hope this is only the beginning of a long and beautiful friendship (with limited uses of the word 'just'. Wink wink). Tina Moss, you and the entire City Owl team are incredible and I am so fortunate to be a part of this publishing family.
If you ever find yourselves in Denver and come across Sojourner's Coffee and Tea, Stella's Coffee Haus, or Comrade Brewing Company, do yourselves a favor and buy yourselves many, many beverages there, because this book would not exist without their delicious crafts.
Finally, to all the people I get to call my family by blood, by marriage, and by choice: thanks for loving me, flaws and all, and making me the person I am. To my best friend, the love of my life, and my partner in mutual weirdness, Richard Rouse—thanks for choosing forever with me.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
After a lifetime of falling in love with all aspects of the written word, KRISTIN ROUSE became an avid reader and, eventually, a writer of "kissing books". She believes in writing where she knows as opposed to strictly what she knows—that said, she's lived all over the world, so this doesn't exactly limit her story settings. She currently lives in Denver with her husband, and can be found on a yoga mat or at a local coffee house with her laptop in equal measure.
Twitter: @krousewrites
Facebook: www.facebook.com/krousewrites/
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