“Never seen ’em.”
She stirred slowly, checking that the heat was on low. “How often do you watch cookies get made?”
“Don’t.”
“But you eat them.”
The kid grinned. “Yeah!” he said, his voice raising in glee.
“So, you know they get made because you eat them, but you really don’t have any idea who makes them.”
“Girls do.”
“Have you seen all the cookies you eat get made by girls?”
“No.”
“Then you can’t prove they weren’t made by boys.”
“Can’t be. Boys are playing ball,” Jonathan said, setting the almost empty sifter on the counter.
“Finish that up, mister,” Leslie said.
Jonathan started cranking again.
“And boys do a lot more than play ball,” she added.
“Yeah, they work.”
“And they watch television and they cook and they clean and they shop….”
Dropping the empty sifter on its side, Jonathan heaved a big sigh, shaking his head, which rested on the hand supported by his elbow. “You don’t know much ’bout boys, huh?” he asked her.
“I know some.”
The little boy jumped down from the bar stool, coming over to stand on tip toe beside her, peering into the pan.
“But not that boys don’t make cookies,” he muttered.
He was certainly persistent. Had Cal been just as stubborn? She couldn’t remember.
Of course, she’d only been two when Cal was Jonathan’s age.
“Boys do make cookies,” she said, thanks to the years of therapy that had taught her to speak up when she had something to say. “You’re making them and you’re a boy.”
Jonathan lost his balance, used a hand on her arm to steady himself. He didn’t respond to her latest comeback, leaving her to wonder if she’d convinced him or if he’d just given up convincing her.
Or maybe the process of chocolate melting had distracted him. He was still watching the pan.
“As soon as this melts, we’re going to pour the flour in here and then put the whole thing in the refrigerator until Kayla wakes up,” she told him.
“You can’t eat cookies out of a pan.”
“And that’s why, when your sister wakes up, we’re going to make little balls out of the dough. We’ll roll them in powdered sugar and then bake them.”
He dropped down from his toes, wandering over to slump at the table. “When do we eat ’em?” He was clearly disappointed.
“As soon as they cool.”
“Before dinner?”
One look at his crestfallen face and her “absolutely not, young man” became “Yep.” No question, she still had some parenting skills to learn.
An hour later, Leslie was just getting to the part where Huck picks up Jim, with Jonathan snuggled next to her, mouth open as he listened, when she heard Kayla jabbering upstairs.
“Come on, young man, your sister’s awake,” she said, giving Jonathan a squeeze.
He pulled abruptly away, as though only now realizing how close he’d been. The little guy was starved for physical affection yet didn’t seem able to avail himself of it.
It was a predicament she understood. And she was scared to death to see it in her nephew.
“Let’s go tell her hello and get her changed so we can make those cookies,” she said lightly, while her heart beat heavily in her chest. She’d made Kip a promise and the moment had presented itself.
Get off the couch, Jonathan. Come upstairs with me. Be healthy and unaware—an innocent five-year-old boy.
“Can’t,” Jonathan said, arms crossed as he held his seat and stared up at her.
“What do you mean you can’t?” she asked, grinning at him, thankful that she’d become so adept at pretending nonchalance, calm, ease, while hiding the panic inside her. “Are your legs broken? I didn’t notice anything happening to them on the way in from the kitchen.”
Jonathan frowned at her. “Boys don’t be around naked girls.”
“Boys don’t stare at naked girls,” she said. “And they don’t ask them to get naked. But as long as boys are only helping take care of them when they’re too little to take care of themselves, it’s okay to be around.”
She’d thought about what she’d say. Had come up with nothing. In the end, the words were just there.
“Daddy said no,” the boy said, not budging an inch from his position on the couch. “And he said girls ain’t s’posed to see naked boys, neither.”
“I’m sure your dad had a good reason at the time.” Leslie reached down, slid her hand beneath Jonathan’s arm to find his hand and gently pulled. “But whatever it was, it’s got nothing to do with right now. Come on, I need your help.”
“Uh-uh.” Jonathan shook his head adamantly, but sounded like he might cry.
Torn between the baby chatter coming from down the hall and the struggling boy, Leslie sat down on the couch again. Kayla knew how to turn around backward and slide off the end of her bed. And there was nothing in her room that could hurt her.
“Hey, Jonathan?” She waited until his dark eyes were trained on her face. “Remember how you told us about Easter time and your daddy gave you that chocolate bunny and you ate the whole thing all at once and it made you sick?”
He nodded, looking guilty.
“Did that mean the chocolate bunny was bad?”
Mouth open again, he shook his head.
“It just meant that the way you chose to use it was bad, huh?”
He nodded.
“Nana!” came from down the hall. Apparently the toddler had decided to remain in her bed until she was collected.
Judging by the tone of the last call, Leslie might be running out of time.
“And what about when you and Kip were wrestling on the floor the other night,” she said, trying to ignore the shaking in her hands. “That was fun, huh?”
The little boy nodded. He wasn’t saying much, but at least she had his attention.
“What if you’d really been fighting and someone had gotten hurt?”
Jonathan shrugged. “I dunno.”
“Sure you do,” she said, nudging his chin as she smiled at him. “It wouldn’t have been fun,” she told him. “In fact, it would’ve turned something fun into something bad.”
He nodded again.
“It’s that way with almost everything, honey,” she told him, afraid she was failing completely here, all the while sensing how vital this conversation was to her nephew’s emotional health. “There’s a good way and a bad way to do things. Just like with the chocolate bunny—instead of enjoying it a bit at a time, you ate it all at once and made yourself sick. Does that mean you should never have a chocolate bunny again?”
“No.”
“No, it doesn’t.”
“Cwy!” Kayla’s wobbly voice wasn’t lacking in volume despite its distress.
“It’s the same when you’re taking care of people,” she told him. “Both boys and girls. Kids need help. That’s the way God made them. And people are supposed to help them. Now, does everyone do the right things—make right choices?”
“No.”
“Some people might ignore a kid who should be helped. Other people might hurt them, instead. But does that mean we should all quit helping?”
“No.”
“No, it doesn’t.” She sounded like a broken record. Jonathan was watching her, his face impassive. Was she making a difference? Was she reaching him at all?
Or, God forbid, was she making things worse?
“Your nana helped you.” Jonathan didn’t budge.
“What if you and Kayla and I were here alone overnight and you were taking a bath and fell and hit your head?”
His eyes grew wide, but he said nothing.
“I’m a girl. Should I just stay away and let you bleed to death?”
“No!”
“Of course not,” she quickly assur
ed him. “Don’t you see, honey? If that happened, it wouldn’t matter that you were naked. I wouldn’t pay any attention to that. I’d just help you.”
Jonathan nodded one more time.
“And it’s the same with Kayla,” she told him, braced to have him close himself off again. “Sometimes Kip and you will be here alone with her, and she’s going to need help with certain things because she’s too little to take care of them herself.”
His hand remained in hers. Leslie took a deep breath and plunged ahead.
“As long as all you’re doing is helping her, and you aren’t misusing that privilege by looking at things you don’t need to look at or touching places you don’t need to touch—like you misused the privilege of being given a whole chocolate bunny by eating it all at once—then you’re being a very good boy. Not a bad one.”
He remained silent. Staring at her.
“Okay?”
“I dunno.”
“NANANA! CWY!” The baby had worked herself up to a full scream.
“Come on.” Leslie took a chance. “Kayla needs our help.”
Slowly, watching her with obvious doubt in his eyes, Jonathan slid off the couch and walked down the hall beside her.
“HI, MOM.” Leslie held the phone to her ear with both hands, sweating and shaking so much she was afraid she might drop it.
“Hi, honey! Just five more days until moving day!”
Clara was flying out the following Saturday night, after supervising the movers as they loaded her possessions on the truck.
“I know,” Leslie said. “I can hardly wait. I had no idea raising kids was so exhausting.”
Clara chuckled. “I’ll be there soon enough, sweetie, and eager to help wherever you need me.”
Ironic that the timing was so off. If Clara had been as available eighteen years before…
Clara asked about the kids, how they were eating, wanting to hear everything they’d said or done since she’d last talked to Leslie two days before. And she talked about Cal, sobbing a little as she told Leslie about an old yearbook she’d found under the bed that Cal had used growing up.
“How’s Kip doing?” she asked about half an hour into the conversation.
“Good!” Leslie said, a whole other set of nerves giving her voice a little more energy than necessary. For some reason, recalling the kisses she’d shared with Kip the night before, while talking to her mother, brought, not embarrassment or humor but a huge sense of shame.
She’d worked through all that. Years ago. She had nothing to be ashamed of. None of what had happened when she was younger had been her fault. She had to believe that. Did believe that.
“Is he there now? I’d like to say hello to him.”
“No,” Leslie said quickly, pacing her bedroom, studying the grains in the wood floor as she held the mobile phone to her ear. “He’s been gone since early this afternoon—moving things around at the office. The buyout becomes official tomorrow, and there were a few disgruntled people who opted for early retirement. He wanted them out before they had a chance to poison any of the other staff.”
“He’s a good man.”
“Yes, he is.”
“Nice-looking, too.”
Leslie stared out the window into the darkness of the mountain behind her house. Had the whole world gone mad?
“Yes, he is.”
“It must be kind of strange, having a man living there with you after you’ve been alone for so long.”
“It is, a little,” she said, her stomach so tightly knotted it hurt. She couldn’t have this conversation with her mother. “But not as hard as you’d expect. This is a big place. He has his suite and I have mine, each with our respective kid across the hall. It’s not very different from living next door to each other in two separate apartments.” Leslie didn’t often lie, but the words fell smoothly off her tongue.
“Oh.” Was that disappointment she heard in her mother’s voice? Clara had given up nagging her about her love life years ago, after Leslie had uncharacteristically run out of patience during a phone call. Clara had been worried about Leslie isolating herself too much, and Leslie had lost her temper. They’d recovered from that episode mostly by pretending it had never happened, but after that, Clara didn’t ask about male companions.
“We put up the tree yesterday,” Leslie said now, infusing her voice with a cheer she didn’t feel. “Did you know that Kip’s dad never got a tree?”
“I didn’t,” Clara said. “But I wondered. I practically begged Kip to come and spend the holiday with us. Even called his father once to try to make some arrangements, but neither one of them ever took me up on it.”
“Well, he’ll be having it with us this year,” she said, in an attempt to make up for any letdown she might have caused her mother a few minutes before. And for the same reason, she remained on the phone, chatting about presents and menus and the going-away party the McCulloughs had thrown for her mom the night before, for another twenty minutes when all she wanted to do was crawl beneath her covers and cry herself to sleep.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
KIP ARRIVED HOME much later than he’d expected. He’d always been used to returning to an empty place, with only the timed lights on to greet him, and yet he was a bit shocked by the disappointment that swept through him when he came in to find that everyone had already gone to bed.
He’d figured the kids would be asleep. But he’d been hoping Leslie would wait up for him.
Especially after the previous night.
Apparently those kisses hadn’t meant as much to her as they had to him. The memory had been distracting him all day. As had fantasies of repeating them that evening.
He thought about having a beer. Opened the refrigerator door. Shut it again. He didn’t want a beer. The scent of fresh-baked cookies wafted from the jar on the counter. Chocolate pixies she’d called them. Said he’d like them. Maybe tomorrow.
Tonight he wanted conversation. He wanted the fact that he was home to matter.
He was tired, he told himself, and needed to get a grip. If he was going to have these kinds of expectations after only one kiss, she’d probably kick him out on his ass. And he wouldn’t blame her a bit.
Of course, had she been the one out late, he would’ve waited up….
Stop it, Webster.
Kip wandered through the “communal” parts of the house, checking to make sure the doors were locked when he knew damn well they would be. Leslie kept her doors locked even in the middle of the day when she was home. And she’d remembered to turn off the lights, too.
She’d been living alone for more than ten years. She didn’t need him to check the house for her.
About to turn around and head to his room, a shower and some sleep, Kip noticed light coming from beneath Leslie’s door. Had she waited up?
Mood brightening, Kip walked quickly down the hall. Had she fallen asleep with the light on? Should he knock and find out?
Would she mind if he just told her he was home and had come to say good-night? That was the polite thing to do. He’d want her to come and tell him, if their situations were reversed.
And he couldn’t have her thinking that last night had meant nothing to him. They were at least close friends now. Which merited saying good-night, didn’t it?
He knocked softly, calm inside and out. And then again, a little louder, conscious of Kayla sleeping across the hall.
Leslie still didn’t reply. And he didn’t want to knock any harder, didn’t want to risk waking Kayla.
He stared at the doorknob, considered turning away and going to bed. But he didn’t want to do that at all.
Should he just walk right in? It would be an infringement of her privacy. They couldn’t go around doing that—not and share a house with any measure of comfort or ease.
But what if she’d fallen asleep with the light on?
Nice try, but she can afford the bill, idiot.
So…what if she was sick? Or hurt? He’d only been
living with her a matter of days, but he already knew that Leslie wasted nothing. Including electricity.
That decided it. Turning the knob slowly, giving her a chance to call out, tell him no, he opened her door.
KIP’S FIRST INSTINCT, after wanting to crawl into bed and spoon with Leslie, was to quietly back out of her room. The light was a night-light, of all things. A purple glass angel outlined in metal, with a heart hanging down from a chain. It was plugged into a receptacle so far above her bed she must’ve had the outlet specially installed.
She was lying on her side, back to the door. Asleep, he assumed.
Until he noticed the pillow covering her head, the fingers clutching it. Or was it the slight shaking that first caught his attention?
“Les?” He didn’t want to startle her—impossible considering the fact that he was in her room at eleven o’clock on a Sunday night and she was in the bed, expecting to be alone until Monday.
He knew he was trespassing, yet he couldn’t go away and leave her. He knew he should. Was well aware that decency dictated it.
“Les?” he said a little more loudly, certain it would be less intrusive to get her attention that way rather than crossing over and taking her in his arms, which was what he longed to do.
She froze, the fingers on the pillow stiffening. All movement of her back and shoulders ceased. He couldn’t even tell if she was breathing.
She’d heard him.
“I know I’m a complete jerk, standing here like this,” he said. “I just came by to tell you I’m home and that I locked the door behind me….” He was rambling; he didn’t recognize the pleading voice as his own. “I saw your light on and knocked and you didn’t answer and…”
Still no movement. Her comforter, white with primary-colored squares, was pulled up to her ears. Her curls, wild and lovely, were spread around her. Wearing the jeans and sweatshirt he’d had on all day, Kip felt dirty.
“Just tell me you’re okay and I’ll go….”
Two words. I’m fine. That was all she had to say to get rid of him. The white and purple room was completely silent. No response.
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