by LJ Evans
“God, I’ve been waiting a really long time for that sound.”
“Stop talking,” she breathed, her hands making their own journey to places she’d stared at but been unable to touch because of the barrier they’d placed between them.
“Wynn.” Her body thrilled at the huskiness of his voice when he said her name as she touched him. “My sock monkey really, really wants to meet your Twinkie.”
She burst out laughing, and he swallowed her laugh with his kisses, and then there was no more talking…
Forever and For Always
Firsts & Lasts
“In your heart, I can still hear,
A beat for every time you kiss me...
I’m keeping you forever and for always.”
—Shania Twain
When I woke the next morning, it was to find Edie pulling at my hand. The one that belonged to the arm that was thrown over Wynn. Wynn was spooned up against me, her backside into my chest, and looking down at her closed eyes, I was full of emotions again. With Wynn in my arms and Edie full of smiles.
Thank God we’d put on clothes. Wynn had her underwear and my t-shirt on. I had my sweats. After I’d been able to touch her and make her gasp and moan in every way I’d ever dreamed of, we’d gone down the hall and showered together where I’d been able to make her moan again. The smile that came across my face thinking about it made Edie smile in return.
When we’d finally made it back to the bedroom last night, we’d put the pajamas on that we normally wore and left the door open so that Edie could see us as she was used to seeing us in the morning.
“Mask and me hungry,” Edie said, bouncing from foot to foot. It was then that I saw it. Or rather, saw what wasn’t there. Her cape. She didn’t have her cape on. My heart that had already been so full from Wynn flipped and constricted once more.
I rubbed Wynn’s arm. She mumbled something but then rubbed her eyes. I looked down at her face, and she smiled back at me with a face so happy that my own happiness seemed dim in comparison. My heart couldn’t take much more. Wynn’s happiness. Edie’s capeless body.
“Hungry,” Edie said again.
“Okay, Chicken Lips. What do you want?” I asked, my eyes going from Wynn back to Edie, trying to convey without words what I wanted Wynn to see.
Her forehead crinkled, finally getting that I was trying to send her a message. She looked over at Edie, and I heard her intake of breath that she held when she saw it. No cape.
“Pancakes?” Edie asked. “Wynn make pancakes?”
Wynn sat up, and I hated that she was no longer in my arms, but that feeling was diminished by the hope that was slowly taking over. I just wanted to make sure that Edie realized she didn’t have the cape on before I got overly excited. Maybe it had just fallen off in bed.
“Pancakes are definitely in order,” Wynn said. “With berries and whipped cream, too.”
She wanted to celebrate as much as I did, but we were both waiting with bated breath for the scream that was sure to come if Edie realized she didn’t have the cape if she hadn’t done it herself.
We crawled out of bed. Wynn grabbed Edie’s hand, and when we hit the hallway, we both saw it at the same time. The cape was sitting at the top of the dirty clothes basket. No way it had gotten there on its own.
I looked at Wynn. Should we mention it? Should we just ignore it? She made a small shrug with her shoulders. She didn’t know how to proceed any more than I did.
I tried to keep my voice light, tried not to put any emotion, good or bad, into it when I asked, “Hey, Eeds, you want me to do laundry today?”
Edie looked up at me and grabbed my hand so that Wynn had one and I had the other. Mask was tucked in her arm pit. It hit me hard. The family picture we made. Morning in the Brennan household suddenly had a totally different meaning than when I was growing up. This one was full of love and acceptance.
“Fly kite?” Edie asked, and I couldn’t contain my happy laugh that Wynn joined in on. Our eyes met, full of joy. I thought I might cry. Tears flooded them, and I blinked them back to look at Wynn and found her doing the same.
“You want to fly your kite today?” I asked, and when she nodded, I added, “I think we can work that out.”
I couldn’t believe it. All my goals were reached. Before Christmas. Hell, before even Thanksgiving. Before wishes for the New Year had to be made. I wondered what I would wish for when I kissed Wynn at midnight on New Year’s Eve, because I couldn’t imagine wanting anything more than this. My girls with me, making pancakes on a Tuesday, and knowing none of us needed to be anywhere else. Knowing that this was where the entire world started and ended. In this tiny apartment in the middle of Tennessee where everyone knew everything about everyone and truth became love.
* * *
Later, Edie was sitting at the park in the middle of a Hula-Hoop with Mask in her arms and the Wonder Woman kite on the ground near her. She proceeded to bury Mask with leaves as I stood watching her. It made me think of Lita covering me with sand when we were kids. She’d buried me, and when I complained that I couldn’t move, she’d laughed before running toward the waves with me yelling for her to come back.
Wynn came up behind me, arms circling me, placing a kiss on the back of my neck. I covered her hands with my own.
“You did a good job,” she said quietly. Her breath tickled my ear and—God help me—it went straight to my sock monkey, making it wake up in ways that were no good in a park full of families. But Edie was going to need a nap soon, and then I’d get Wynn to myself again.
I hadn’t acknowledged her words out loud because I was trying to get my body under control so I wouldn’t embarrass myself, so she continued. “You took two broken girls and made them whole again. I know you think you failed with Lita, but you didn’t.”
Her words tugged at my guilt and my sorrow that would mostly likely be with me till I died but wasn’t stopping me from moving forward with my life because I wouldn’t let it.
Wynn moved around so that she was facing me, arms still wrapped around me, her scent filling me. She looked up at me with her crystal blue eyes and smiled. “You’ve done the one thing she needed you to do most. Take care of Edie.”
I kissed her gently. “I love you,” I told her because I couldn’t remember if I’d actually said the words out loud to her last night after she’d said them to me. I’d felt them, and I thought I’d done a good job of showing them, but I couldn’t remember saying them.
“Am I your first love, Lonnie?”
“My first, my last, my always.”
Edie ran up to us, squeezing her tiny body in between ours. I lifted her up so that she was in our embrace, part of our circle, part of the family that we’d somehow created out of the madness of the summer, and it hit me then. Lita had given me a gift. An unanswered prayer that turned into the best thing in my life. The thing I’d never thought I wanted that was now the only thing I’d ever want again. I looked up into the sky and smiled at her because I knew, with every fiber in my being, that she was looking down at me and smiling her damn smirk and telling me she told me so.
As we turned to walk away, another leaf fell from the tree above us. It wasn’t a single leaf; it was another group of three leaves like on my girls’ birthday. This time, I pulled the joined stems to me and tucked them into the pocket of my coat.
I’m keeping them, I said silently to the sky. All of them.
And I swear there was a whisper on the wind that answered back. “Forever and always.”
THE END
EPILOGUE
HERE I AM
“It's a new day it's a new plan
I've been waiting for you. Here I am.”
—Bryan Adams
The morning was cool even though it was still August as I watched my two girls enter the classroom. I trailed behind them, slowly. Edie was holding Wynn’s hand, a Wonder Woman backpack on her shoulders, a dress that looked a hell of a lot like her ballet tutu on her body. My heart was b
eating faster than I thought possible.
Wynn’s stomach stuck out from her open jean jacket, our child making himself known in a way that filled me with so many complicated emotions every time I saw it. Every time I touched it. Every time I felt him move beneath my fingers in her womb. Joy. Love. Hope.
It was another new chapter for all of us. Edie was starting kindergarten. She looked like all the other kids in the room now. Not too small or too thin like she had been when she’d first come to me. The roundness of toddlerhood had not quite left her or any of them yet. They all had innocent smiles on their faces. Edie’s smile was huge. She wasn’t even nervous while I…I was a blubbering idiot.
Blubbering like I had when Wynn and I had gotten married over a year ago. In a small little ceremony at the lake with only the people we loved most in attendance. Mark had been there, which was okay because Mark was trying hard these days to be a part of our lives. He’d made several trips to Tennessee to see us. Always alone. But this time, he’d brought Rochelle with him, and that was harder to stomach. At least Rochelle hadn’t had her angry face on that day. Instead, she’d seemed….accepting.
On that perfect day, Wynn, Edie, and I had become a family in the name of the law, even though we’d already been a true family long before that. We’d gotten our paperwork, not only for our marriage, but for Edie’s adoption, too. Edie was mine and Wynn’s. We’d both adopted her. She was ours, even though she’d always be Lita’s as well.
I’d cried as I said my vows to Wynn, and all the guys in the band had given me shit about it. But I hadn’t cared, because the day had been full of sunlight and family. Love and new beginnings.
It was that same day, as we left the lake and the reception we’d had there, that I’d seen the “For Sale” sign on the property frontage just beyond the lake’s turnoff. I’d stopped the truck, backed up, and traveled down a dirt road that wasn’t much more than crushed grass.
Wynn and I had fallen in love with the vacant lot on sight. It had a little hill where you could just get a glimpse of the lake through the trees. It was perfect, just like our day had been perfect.
The house, with its wraparound porch that would have that same glimpse of the lake, was almost finished now. Tim had worked hard to get it done before Wynn delivered our son. His first grandchild. I couldn’t wait to have us all tucked in there. The four of us. Our expanding family.
Mia and Derek had bought the property next to ours. They’d had to do some research on who owned it and then had proceeded to make the man an offer that had left him breathless. But they needed the property as much as we did. We all needed homes away from suburbia. With gates and security.
Our band’s popularity had continued to grow, and when our fans had found out where we lived, it suddenly hadn’t been safe anymore in our small town. I felt bad about that. I felt bad that we couldn’t leave the doors unlocked for people to just knock and let themselves in like when I’d first moved to Tennessee. But we couldn’t. Because some people were whack jobs.
So now, Derek and I were both building homes where we could make sure our families were safe. Where we could still be a part of the small community that we’d come to love. Where we could all just be close together.
The noise in the classroom brought me back to my girls.
Wynn shook hands with Edie’s friendly teacher who we’d met the week before at a kindergarten parent meeting. Wynn loved being in the classroom. She was going to be a great parent volunteer because she was great with kids.
Wynn had gotten her teaching credential, but she hadn’t put it to use yet. It was just easier to have her with me when we toured. To have her and Edie with me. And that meant no job to tie her down. Although I suspected that might have to change now that Edie was in school and we’d have a newborn.
Wynn helped Edie put her backpack on the hook with her name above it. Edie smiled as she held Wynn’s hand, and they walked to a table where Edie’s name was also written. They were so close, my two girls, that it often tore my heart with happiness. Edie sat down, and Wynn knelt next to her. She adjusted the bow at the end of Edie’s braid.
“You okay, Eeds?” The emotion in Wynn’s voice was clear. Her tears were barely in check. If she lost it, there’d be no saving me.
Edie smiled. “Yep. You can leave now.”
I saw Wynn’s smile tremble; I felt my own heart constrict. We both loved that she was this independent when, not even two years ago, she’d been unable to be left alone in a bed without crying. But it was also hard…that agonizing knowledge that she didn’t need us.
Edie leaned down, talking to Wynn’s stomach. “Hey Stephen, make sure they don’t cry too much without me.”
I chuckled, and that brought Wynn’s and Edie’s eyes to mine. Edie jumped out of her chair and ran to me. I caught her up in my arms and hugged her tight, fighting the goddamn tears more. Wuss.
“Love you, Lonnie.”
“Love you right back, Chicken Lips,” I told her. She pushed against me, and I set her down.
She skipped back to her seat, making a shooing motion with her hands at us. That made my smile widen. I helped Wynn up, our fingers twining together as we walked out the door. We both kept looking back, but Edie had already moved on and was talking to the little girl sitting next to her.
Wynn wiped at her eyes.
“She’s amazing,” Wynn said.
“If you keep this shit up, I’m going to be a goddamn mess before we make it back to the construction site.”
“Daddy will understand.”
“But Derek will never let me live it down.”
“Someday he’ll understand. When he has his own.”
“I can’t believe they haven’t popped one out yet. I can’t believe I beat him to it.”
“Because it was a competition?”
“Sure.”
“God, you guys are awful.”
“You know I’m not,” I said with a guttural growl. She slapped my arm at my innuendo. But she was smiling, with that little quirk to her lips that I adored, instead of crying, and that had been my goal.
We walked to the SUV we’d bought for Wynn. The baby’s car seat was already strapped into the backseat beside Edie’s. A family car. For our family.
I stopped Wynn before she could get in. I pulled her to me and kissed her. A long, tender kiss full of all my love for her and our life together. Full of the hopes and dreams that we had slowly started to make a reality for both of us.
“Hey, Wynn,” I whispered.
“Yeah,” she said, breathless from my kiss just like I loved to make her.
“We don’t have to be at the construction site for another hour, right?”
She nodded, leaning to kiss my neck and whisper back. “Does your sock monkey want to visit my Twinkie for a while?”
“I thought you’d never ask.”
THE END, AGAIN
WARNING: The next page starts an EPILOGUE for the entire MY LIFE AS AN ALBUM SERIES. It contains spoilers for all the books, so if you haven’t read the other books, and plan to, you might want to skip it and come back later. *wink emoji*
If you have read the other books, I hope you enjoy this SERIES EPILOGUE and the return of all the characters that I have so loved creating for all of you.
HAPPY READING!
MY LIFE AS AN ALBUM SERIES: EPILOGUE
I Was Here
“I want to try to touch a few hearts in this life.”
—Lady Antebellum
The light was fading in the late summer skies when Cam entered the stadium. Blake was out front with their six-year-old Mayson, who hadn’t shown any Southern-boy interest in football much to everyone’s chagrin, and three-year-old Khiley, who reminded Cam of herself when she was three. All motion and little patience.
She needed a minute before the family showed up to think about Jake. To collect her thoughts. They were having a private ceremony tonight to christen the stadium that her friends and family had sponsored after the old one
had burned down. It had been weirdly coincidental that it was completed ten years after Jake had died. Another strange connection of dots in a universe that routinely found a way to reassure her that things were going to be okay.
Tomorrow, there would be a huge to-do for the formal ribbon cutting. The whole town and all of Derek and Lonnie’s fans would be there. Many of the people were only showing up to see Watery Reflection play. Derek and Lonnie hardly ever had a chance to play in small stadiums any more after six years of touring and making platinum-charting albums. They’d become award-winning song writers and artists, and Blake’s business had taken off because of it. Every up-and-coming artist from here to the coast (both coasts) wanted Blake and his partner to be their lawyers too.
All of Jake’s loved ones had found success in some way. Ways he would never have seen coming when he’d been the biggest star of them all. Cam often wondered what he would think of it. Of this world they’d created without him but that was still so completely wrapped around the void of him.
Cam looked at the press box and the sign over it that read “Jake C. Phillips Stadium – Home of the Bulldogs” and her heart leapt into her throat. Jake would have been smiling. He would have tried to play it off like he didn’t want anyone to name a stadium after him, but he would have been grinning nevertheless. She would have had to check his ego with a snotty comment, and she would have done it without thought. She would have brought him back to earth and to her.