Worth the Risk

by K. Bromberg

  “Chocolate chip cookies?” My mouth waters at just the thought of them.

  He nods enthusiastically, and I notice how the fingers on his right hand are crossed for luck. This kid is killing me in the best kind of way.

  “You’re on your way there right now?”

  “Yep.”

  “We didn’t mean to interrupt your day,” his nana says as she steps forward and puts a protective hand on Luke’s shoulder. “I’m Betsy Malone, Grayson’s mom.” She extends her hand, and I stand to shake it.

  “Nice to meet you.”

  She’s striking. There’s a graceful fluidity to her when she moves, her smile is welcoming in every sense of the word, and her eyes—so similar to Grayson’s—are the sort that see way more than you want them to see.

  “Like I said, we didn’t mean to just barge on in here, but it’s a beautiful afternoon and we thought you might like to get out and enjoy Sunnyville instead of being cooped up in this office.”

  “Thank you for thinking of me,” I say with caution because I know how sensitive Grayson is to Luke being around women he is seeing.

  Seeing? Is that what we’re doing? Seeing each other?

  But if no one knows that’s what is going on, would it bug him if I went to the picnic with them?

  I really don’t want to turn Luke down, but how exactly do I ask to call Grayson to find out if this is okay and not offend Betsy or Luke?

  “I think I . . .” I look from Betsy to Luke and then back to Betsy. “Does Grayson know you’re here?”

  “Nope,” Luke says and laughs. “Nana is all about spontaneity. She says it’s the best kind of adventure.” He looks back her way as if he’s so proud that she’s taught him this.

  “Grayson will be fine with it,” Betsy says with a nod. “But you’re more than welcome to give him a call and ask. Although, while he’s at the dispatch desk, he typically doesn’t carry his cell. It’s a department protocol thing.” She waves a hand in indifference. “If he gets mad, I’ll take the heat.”

  Stuck in indecision with a pair of puppy-dog eyes loaded with hope staring at me, I put my hands on my knees and bend over so Luke and I are face to face.

  “So, this is like a friend date? Food and fun and friends?”

  “And nanas.” He bounces on his toes.

  “Okay,” I say with a definitive nod.

  Luke’s eyes widen, and his smile does even more so. “You mean you want to go with us?”

  “Of course, buddy. I just need a few minutes to sort some things.”

  “Okay, we’ll wait out here.”

  He shuffles his way out to the reception area with Betsy in tow. I have a task list a million miles long and yet I can’t help but wonder why I’m walking to a picnic when a few weeks ago I would have laughed at the idea of doing it.

  My desk is loaded with Post-It notes of things I have to do, but I shut my laptop with a click and walk out of the office without any qualms about leaving it until tomorrow. I’m actually kind of looking forward to sinking my heels into the grass—there has to be grass at a picnic, right? And getting to hang out with Luke.

  The small-town air is affecting me.

  That has to be what it is.

  But I let it affect me even more, along with Luke’s giggles, as we play chocolate chip cookie warfare—a game we made up as we sit under the shady elm on the outskirts of the playground at his school. My cheeks hurt from laughing, and I know for a fact a little piece of my heart has been lost to Luke.

  “Luke. Man. Come play.”

  Luke angles his head over to his friend—a cute little guy with red hair and the most adorable freckles across his nose and cheeks. “Sorry, Jim, I’m busy with my friend.”

  “You sure? We’re in an epic battle over here.” He points to the handball court.

  Luke nods and smiles. “Yep.”

  “You don’t have to entertain me, buddy. I’m just enjoying the sunshine. Go. Play. I want to watch.”

  “You want to watch?” His eyes light up just like his smile.

  “Of course, I do.” He gives me one last look for reassurance before he runs off, and I call out to him, “Good luck.”

  So I watch. Battle after battle of handball with rules I don’t know. I’m cognizant of some of the other moms peering at me from behind their sunglasses. Betsy does her best to introduce me to everyone who comes over. I know most of them are here to satiate their curiosity as they ask me benign questions that seem simple on the surface but are really searching for more.

  But it’s okay.

  The sunshine and laughter and a huge grin on Luke’s face make the chocolate chip cookies I’m going to have to exercise off and the dirt I have to clean off my heels worth it ten times over.

  A fist banging on the door shatters the quiet of the house and scares the hell out of me. At first, I freeze, but the sound is so threatening that it has me quickly back-stepping into my kitchen and out of the line of sight from the front windows.

  “Open up, Sidney.”

  Grayson?

  My heart leaps into my throat and then lands with a confused thud over being excited to see him and at the same time knowing something is wrong.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask as I open the door. The minute I catch sight of his expression—a mask of fury—I wish I had pretended I wasn’t home.

  Without a word, he barrels past me. “Shut the door.”

  “Grayson? What is—?”

  “You!” he shouts as he turns around and jabs a finger in my direction. “You are what’s wrong.”

  “I—uh . . . what?”

  “What in the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  “Letting you into my house so you can yell at me when I obviously shouldn’t have. Can we back up here, so you can tell me what’s going on?”

  The muscle in his jaw ticks as he stares at me. “You went to the mother-son picnic with Luke. Are you out of your mind?”

  I stare at him—his fury unmasked—and know without a doubt I made a huge mistake. It takes a few seconds for my thoughts to line up so I sound coherent. “It isn’t what you think.”

  “What I think?” His laugh is cold and unwelcome. “What exactly is it that you think I’m thinking?”

  A million things flash through my mind and unfortunately, all of them spill out in a tangled mess. “I didn’t mean anything by it. I didn’t even know it was a mother-son picnic. I wasn’t trying to manipulate the situation to fuel more rumors. I wasn’t trying to get in good with Luke. I wasn’t trying to . . .” My words fade off as he just stands there and stares at me with hard eyes and mouth a straight line. “They stopped by the office and asked me to come. He was so sweet asking me on a date. I told him I’d go with him as a friend. That’s it. I met your mom,” I ramble as I twist my fingers together. “She was sweet, too. I didn’t think it was a big deal.”

  “Of course, you didn’t think it was a big deal.” His voice escalates in pitch with each word. “After everything I’ve said to you. How could you go with him without asking me first—”

  “Your mom said it wasn’t a big deal. That you were at work and—”

  “And my mom isn’t raising my son. I am.”

  “Grayson—”

  “Just stop. Your excuses. Your reasons. You’re proving me right.”

  “What the hell is that supposed to mean? Proving you right?”

  “Nothing. Just . . .” He holds his hands up in front of him as if saying this is too much and not worth it as he takes a step toward the door.

  “You know what? Screw you, Grayson. You don’t have a right to come here and chew me out. Your mom and Luke showed up, they asked me to go get some fresh air. If you think your concerns about Luke and his attachment to women didn’t cross my mind, then you’re an ass and don’t know me very well. They asked. I went. Big freaking deal. Now get out.” I point to the door, my emotions a tumultuous eddy inside me.

  I’ve thought about him for days. Relived every water-soaked mome
nt and what happened with him after. Looked forward to my date tomorrow night with him. So, to have him come here and treat me as if I did something horrible when it was completely innocent is a crock of shit.

  “Sidney.” His fists clench and unclench. His eyes fire with anger and uncertainty about what to do next.

  “It seems that, no matter what I do, I’m wrong. Luke’s a great kid, Grayson. Incredible, even, and that means a lot when it comes from a woman like me who has a hard time relating to kids.” I look at my hands for a moment before looking back up to his eyes. “There were no ulterior motives today. He was so adorable with his flowers that I couldn’t say no. Your mom was teaching him what a gentleman does, and I realize now that it wasn’t my place to help her . . . but I did, and I’m sorry you’re upset because of it. Like I said before, I was conscious of what he was asking, of how he’d perceive things. I figured since your mother stopped by . . . I don’t know.”

  He scrubs a hand over his face and mutters, “My goddamn mother. Her and her search for a wife.”

  “Search for a what?” I ask, not sure if I heard him right.

  “Nothing.” He walks to the window that overlooks the backyard and the mesmerizing rows of vines on the hills beyond. When he speaks again, his voice is more serious, resigned. “You know Luke has a major crush on you, right? You know he had been worried about this picnic for the past few months because he thought he was going to be left out. I offered to take him. I offered to dress up as any superhero he wanted so I could prove to him that I could hang with the moms here, too. That he wasn’t so different. When, in reality, I would have stood out like a sore thumb. I would have been the talk of the damn town, but it doesn’t matter because he’s my son. He’s my job to take care of and protect.”

  “Grayson . . .”

  “He asked my mom to take him, so I went to work, thinking my mom was going alone. When they came home, he wouldn’t stop talking about how much fun he had, about how you were there, too, stepping in to be his mom.”

  Well, that explains his anger.

  “I didn’t step in to be his mom.” He’s blowing this out of proportion, but I don’t dare say that to him. I’m not a parent, so I have zero legs to stand on when it comes to any opinion I may have.

  “Christ.” He paces the short distance of the room and runs a hand through his hair and exhales. “How am I going to tell him otherwise?”

  “What do you mean? He’s old enough to know that he can’t expect every woman he sees you with or who is nice to him to be his mom.”

  Grayson laughs, but it holds no humor. “Easy to say when it’s coming from a twenty-eight-year-old woman. He’s an eight-year-old kid with the pressure to be like everyone else when he knows he isn’t. All he wants to do is fit in. All he wants is for kids not to ask him why he doesn’t have a mom, or why his mom doesn’t love him, when I pretend day in and day out that she does for his sake. So, don’t tell me he should look at it like you do, because it’s nowhere near the same.”

  “I know it isn’t. And I know you try your best—he’s an incredible kid, and it shows. But Grayson, at some point, you have to take a harder line or he’s only going to end up being hurt more by it.”

  When he turns to face me, he looks like a man lost in No Man’s Land. Torn between protecting his son from life’s harsh realities and admitting that he needs to gently break them to him. His sigh fills the small room, and when he meets my eyes I know his temper has faded enough for him to really hear me. “You’re right.” He shrugs in resignation. “I know it, and it fucking kills me to admit it because that means I’ve failed him as a parent.”

  “Gray—”

  “No. I’m doing the best I can, and it isn’t enough. It’s such a hard thing as a parent to recognize that fine line where protecting your child turns into hurting your child.” I step forward and put a hand on his arm and squeeze, his sudden vulnerability coming on the heels of his fiery temper is almost unnerving. “He’s had a rough couple of weeks. Nightmares. The fight . . . I don’t know what’s bringing all this on, but I know it’s on me.”

  “My mom used to tell me there are no instructions to having a kid, and being a parent is one huge learning mistake after another.”

  He gives a measured nod but keeps his eyes focused out the window to the front yard. I hate that he won’t look at me. “You shouldn’t have gone today without talking to me first.”

  I open my mouth to speak and then close it, my inability to read his body language giving me pause. So I say the only thing I can. “I’m sorry.”

  He nods but doesn’t look my way. “I’ve gotta get back to Luke. To home.” And without waiting to see if I respond at all, he opens the door and exits completely different than he was when he entered.

  Resigned and silent.

  I stand at the window and watch him—those broad shoulders of his as he walks toward his truck, the way he slides behind the wheel, rests his elbow on the sill of the open window, and runs a finger over his lip.

  He sits there for some time, seemingly lost in thought. The sight is heartbreaking. A man so strong otherwise, conflicted over teaching his son truths he knows will hurt him.

  When he pulls away from the curb a few minutes later, I pick up my cell and call my father just to say hi.

  Watching Grayson struggle with this has made me understand my father a little bit more now, and how hard making his decision to send me here must have been on him.

  The morning coffee rush is in full swing as I sit in the back of Better Buzz with a cup of my own and work on my laptop. It’s louder and more chaotic than the office, but it makes me feel like I’m back in the city. It makes me not feel so homesick when, after last night and everything with Grayson, I am desperately so.

  He may not have walked away in the fit of rage he stormed into my house with, but his silent resignation almost feels worse.

  Is he still mad at me? I don’t know.

  What I do know is that every part of me wanted to drive over to his house and talk to him . . . but I took a step back and told myself that he was dealing with Luke. That Luke comes first. That my showing up would only have proved to him that I think of myself first, when I’ve been fighting against that preconception since we first met.

  Zoey. I miss her, and if she were here, she’d calm my crazy—her warm hugs, knowing looks, and the effortless way she seems to just get me. I miss the fresh flowers at the corner florist stand that I used to pass every day on the way to Thorton Publishing’s main office. I miss Stink, the homeless man parked on Greer and 4th who I brought some kind of food to a few days a week. I even miss my own place, with its seemingly endless supply of hot water and its pillow-loaded bed.

  Funny how I didn’t realize how homesick I was until Grayson got mad at me, and how alone I was here until Rissa didn’t pick up her phone. That is probably for the better, though, since I can’t tell her about what happened.

  “Sidney, is that you?”

  When I look up from my laptop, I find Betsy Malone standing at the coffee doctoring station with a cautious smile on her lips.

  “Hi.” We eye each other with a wariness that says we both know what this conversation is going to be about but are uncertain if we want to go there.

  “May I have a minute of your time?” she asks, but before I answer, she has already crossed the short distance and is lowering herself into the empty chair across from me.

  “Uh, yeah, sure.” I laugh the words out, my sudden uneasiness showing. “What can I do for you?”

  She stares at her hands, which are wrapped around her paper to-go cup, and it’s a long minute before she meets my gaze. She looks nervous. Nervous, when yesterday I found her to be not only quite funny and inquisitive but also carefree and open.

  “I need to apologize for a couple of things.”

  “If this is about yesterday,” I say and shake my head, “you don’t need to apologize for anything.”

  “Yes, I do. I told you it would be okay and
that I’d take the heat for it and . . .”

  “And I’m a grown woman who can make her own decisions.” I smile warmly at her. “Let me guess, he overreacted and unleashed his temper on you, too?”

  Her eyes well with tears briefly before she blinks them away. “He may have overreacted . . . but I deserved it.” Her silence as she stares at the steam coming from her coffee quiets the protest on my lips. My reassurance won’t matter. It’s her son’s rebukes that will hit her the hardest. She shrugs and looks up at me. “I was curious about you. All I know is what Luke has told me and the gossip from town, but not a single word from Grayson. That in and of itself says a lot, so maybe I bypassed asking Gray if it was okay to let Luke invite you . . . maybe I told you he would be okay with it when I wasn’t one hundred percent certain. I only wanted to see if it was all true.”

  “You wanted to see if I was good enough for Grayson?”

  Betsy clears her throat. “That isn’t what I said.”

  “You don’t have to. He’s your son. Luke’s your grandson. Just like I’m sure you’ve heard rumors about me—then and now—I’ve heard them about you.” Her lips purse and eyes narrow. “Like how fiercely protective you are of your family. How you want all your boys settled down and happy. I get it. I do . . .” But I was the one who got his wrath because of it.

  “I know Grayson’s wishes for Luke come first. They always should. I overstepped, and because of it, I landed us both in hot water—irrational, overreacted, or not. I’m sorry. I . . .” The sincerity swimming in Betsy’s eyes, and the disappointment in herself over her actions, is clear as day. As much as I want to be mad at her, I can’t. She didn’t do this alone. Knowing how Grayson felt about women around Luke, I should have known better. I should have made an excuse and not gone to the picnic. Luke would have been disappointed, but at least then I would have been respecting Grayson’s wishes. “Please forgive me,” she says.