by Alyse Zaftig
In most ways, it was a dream kitchen to cook in. Logan and I started to prep chicken breasts. He had everything ready to go. It was simple and fun to cook chicken parmesan with him. He pre-heated the oven while I rolled the chicken breasts in breadcrumbs. Chicken parmesan was one of our favorite meals and always had been. He had a portion of the plate loaded with Annabelle’s chicken nuggets with parmesan on top of them. With a quick twist of a hand, he loaded the glassware into the top-most oven and set a timer.
“If I put it into the lower one, Annabelle always wants to take a peek. She hit her head once using it as a jungle gym.”
“I like to swing,” announced Annabelle from her play area, still watching Peppa Pig.
“She got a good goose egg out of it,” commented Logan. “She loves watching baking shows.”
“Who doesn’t?” I asked rhetorically.
Annabelle started dancing around the living room, swinging her little stuffed dog around and singing to herself. She looked like she was busy.
“So how have you been?” I asked Logan.
“Busy. Keeping track of the kid and running my business is no joke.”
“What happened to Romi?”
“We were two different people. I can’t regret Annabelle, but Romi had no intention of being a mom, really. She couldn't get out of here fast enough with some of our liquid cash. Luckily, my business was small enough for her not to ask for stock. And being my own boss has been a godsend since Annabelle still naps and I can get a nanny part-time for when I need to go to meetings. And the home office is big enough for her playpen, or it was when she was smaller.”
“Logan Simpson, stay-at-home dad.”
“Who knew?” said Logan. “It’s been fun. I don’t think she misses her mother very much. We split when Annabelle was one, so she doesn’t have a lot of memories of the two of us together. Romi has every other weekend, but she rarely shows up. She had a tummy tuck and other work done. The last I heard, she was living in California. She sends birthday and Christmas gifts, but that’s about it.”
I was stunned. Who wouldn’t want to spend all their time with a beautiful little girl like Annabelle, especially if she was 50% made of her DNA? She was so stinking cute. She was obviously used to amusing herself, given the way that she was now attempting cartwheels in her play space. Logan had obviously raised a very independent child.
“And you?”
“I went to Harvard after IU,” I said.
“Yeah, my mom told me.”
“I pulled together a business plan for a publishing business. The old way of publishing was to print a bunch of books and hope for the best. I run a publishing business that takes advantage of being digital-first before we commit to doing print runs. All our decisions are data-driven based on the performance of e-books.”
“Sounds fancy,” commented Logan.
“It’s a lot of fun. I have a bunch of good editors with good instincts. At the beginning, it was just me and a slush pile. Now, I have industry veterans who have good noses and can tell which books pass the sniff test.”
“I don’t have much time to read nowadays. I’m always chasing after the Munchkin.”
“It’s weird to have reading be my job,” I said. “Normally, my acquisitions editors handle most things, but I read all of the works that make the final cut. We have a unique revenue structure that heavily rewards authors who can turn their books into bestsellers.”
“What about movies? Have any of your books been turned into films?”
“There’s at least one startup that does independent films based off of romances. We’ve sold film rights to a bunch of our titles, but none of them have come to fruition.” I licked my lips, which I noticed he followed with his eyes. “What does a girl have to do to get a cold drink around here?”
“Do you drink IPAs?” asked Logan. “I don’t drink too much heavy stuff with the Munchkin around.”
“IPA is fine,” I responded, shrugging my shoulders. “I’m not too choosy about beer.”
“It’s Hoosier beer,” he slung back, taking two beers out of the fridge and using a magnetic bottle opener from the fridge to open them up. The bottle opener had a smiling real estate agent on it and a phone number.
I took the first sip, which went down smoothly. “Do you remember how weird it was to realize that we had almost identical tastes in food and drink?”
Logan smiled. “Yup.”
Both of us were remembering that we pretty much liked or preferred everything the other did. We were both addicted to Garden Salsa Sun Chips in high school. I guessed that Romi hadn’t done the same with him, from the way that his smile started to fade. I’d touched on a memory he’d rather forget.
Annabelle bounded into the kitchen and pulled my hand. “You put the chicken away,” she said. “Now it’s time to play with me.”
Chapter 5
She tugged me into their living room, which I gingerly stepped into. Her toys covered most of the available surfaces. “Now you get to be a princess, and I’m the queen like Elsa,” said Annabelle. She put a plastic sparkly tiara on my head. She had a queen’s crown with sequins on it.
“What are we playing?” I asked, charmed by her self-confidence.
“Tea party,” she said with an implied duh in her voice. She had a toy tea set that was pink. I sat there trying not to giggle as she gravely poured out pretend tea into our teacups. “Daddy doesn’t like sitting here.”
It was really hard not to laugh. The seats at her tea table were miniscule. There wasn’t a chance that Logan fit on these chairs. I was sitting with my legs criss-cross applesauce to fit at the table. I lifted my teacup to my mouth before she shrieked, “Not yet! Our party isn’t complete yet.”
“Sorry,” I quickly blurted out. “Who else needs to come?”
“Daddy,” she said firmly.
“Last time I played tea party, my knees ached for two days,” Logan commented.
“Daddy,” Annabelle said with a warning tone in her voice. “You know the rules.”
“No whiners,” he chuckled. “Okay.” He sat down just like I had. The table was the perfect height for a three-year-old girl, which meant that it was a very low table for full-sized adults. Logan the former basketball player was squished.
We played tea party, as directed by Annabelle’s precocious executive skills, until the timer told us that the chicken parmesan was done. Logan expertly slid the chicken out of the oven to let it rest for a little while.
“Wash your hands, pumpkin.” Logan scooped Annabelle up and held her near the kitchen sink so that she could wash her hands.
“You, too, lady,” said Annabelle.
“Her name is Candace.”
“Candace,” Annabelle corrected herself.
I loved being bossed around by this tiny Munchkin. “I like her executive leadership skills,” I joked.
“Believe me, she loves to boss people around. She got it from Romi.”
“Sure,” I chuckled, “Mr. Basketball Team Captain had nothing to do with it.”
We shared a grin. Sometimes, I gave him a hard time because his ego was so big. It had been years since we had even seen each other. But it felt like we’d been dating just yesterday.
“Maybe she got a little from her old man,” said Logan.
We sat down and dug into the chicken parmesan. Annabelle had her own high-chair and used her hands to eat. Logan and I were using actual utensils. All of a sudden, Annabelle stood up.
“Down, please,” she asked like a tiny princess. Logan picked her up and swung her around before putting her on her feet.
Logan and I didn’t talk while we ate what was one of our favorite meals. Romi had good taste in ovens, I could say that much. It tasted like restaurant-quality food. When we were done, I cleared the table with him in companionable silence. It was so easy to be with Logan. With him, I always knew where I should be.
“I don’t feel so good,” said Annabelle before leaning forward and hurling on the car
pet of the living room.
Chapter 6
“Oh no!” I exclaimed.
“It’s fine,” said Logan wearily. “Sometimes kids throw up.” He dug under the kitchen sink to get cleaning supplies.
“Don’t move for a little, sweetheart,” I said. I didn’t want her trailing vomit all over the carpet. Logan was already kneeling next to her to give her a kiss on the temple. “Hold still, sweet pea.”
She was crying. “She feels hot,” commented Logan. Annabelle responded by throwing up some more.
“I don’t think it was the nuggets. What did she have for lunch?”
“I don’t know. Her nanny took care of her during a meeting I had today.”
I knelt next to Annabelle and took her temperature with the back of my hand. “She’s burning up.” Logan grimly got to his feet and went to the medicine cabinet. He had one of those thermometers that you could scan someone’s forehead with. “It’s over a hundred,” Logan said.
“Do you think that we should take her to the hospital?”
“Yeah.” Logan had finished cleaning up the vomit by then, so we stood up. “I need to get her a new shirt.”
I just knelt next to a crying, miserable little girl. “We’re going to the doctor’s.”
If anything, her sobs got louder. “I hate going to the doctor. They always stick me with needles.” Annabelle was still young enough that going to the doctor’s meant getting immunizations.
“It’s not that kind of doctor’s visit, pumpkin.” I wanted to kiss her, but her shirt had vomit on it. I settled for giving her a temple kiss like her dad had done. She felt very hot.
“Here you go, sweet pea.” Logan had her shirt changed in a half second, with the ease of practice that came from being a single parent. “Let’s get you into the car.” He snagged a plastic bag in case she needed to throw up in the car, and then we were heading to St. Vincent’s. I sat in the back so I could reach her if she needed me. She was holding my hand with her tiny one in a death grip. I thought that Logan’s reaction to her vomit had scared her, too. He probably didn’t normally take her to the doctor when she threw up. But the combination of her temperature and the vomit added up to her being sicker than the normal childhood fevers that all kids got while their immune systems built up.
When we got to the emergency room, the waiting room was full. A bored nurse asked Logan some questions before giving him forms to fill out. Her primary concern was not the patient but the insurance card that Logan produced. She pointed towards some empty seats. “Someone will be with you shortly.”
Annabelle still looked miserable and like she was on the verge of hurling again. We still had the plastic bag. The long wait time was annoying, but there were people who were actively bleeding in the waiting room. Logan and I settled back with Annabelle between us, holding our hands.
“If you need to barf, just say so, okay?” I asked Annabelle.
“My tummy hurts,” responded Annabelle.
Not a good sign. We sat there for what felt like hours before we were called by a different bored nurse.
“What seems to be the problem?” she asked us.
“Annabelle has some kind of stomach bug. She has a temperature.”
The nurse started taking Annabelle’s vitals; she then took Annabelle’s temperature. “Pretty high for a little one,” she commented. “The doctor will be in soon.” The nurse swept out of the room.
“It only took an hour,” I said to Logan.
“I wish urgent care was open at this time of night,” hissed Logan. “I hate going to the emergency room. Annabelle’s pediatrician is on vacation right now, or I would’ve paid for a house call.” Apparently not all doctor’s visits were the bad kind if Logan had a relationship with Annabelle’s doctor where the doctor came to Logan’s house.
The doctor came in and frowned at the computer. “Stomach trouble, is it?”
“Yes,” Logan replied tersely. The doctor started examining Annabelle.
“And a temperature over a hundred,” he read out from the computer. “I can give her some antibiotics that’ll make her right as rain.”
“Okay,” I said. Annabelle still looked utterly miserable. Logan looked really tense, his fists clenched.
“You can fill this at whichever pharmacy you prefer,” he said, printing out a description that was e-signed. “Have a good day.”
As soon as he was gone, I said, “I hate emergency rooms. All that waiting for two minutes of a doctor’s time.”
Annabelle said, “My tummy hurts.” I got there with the bag in time for her to aim into it.
“Let’s get out of here.” Logan’s face had new lines in it. We drove to the nearest 24-hour Walgreens to get her antibiotics. Annabelle fell asleep in the car holding my hand. When we got back to Logan’s house, Annabelle woke up.
“Hey, princess, I need to go.”
She clung to my hand. “No!”
Chapter 7
“She doesn’t live with us, pumpkin. She has to go home to her own bed with her mommy and daddy,” explained Logan.
“No!”
Trying to reason with an angry and sick three-year-old was a losing battle. “I can stay over if you really want me to.”
“Don’t leave,” pleaded Annabelle. “Mommy always leaves.”
Ouch. But I felt uncomfortable staying in the house with my old flame, even if I had a spot on the couch in Annabelle’s play space.
“We have a guest bedroom,” Logan said as if everything was decided. “I’ll get you new towels.”
I guessed that Annabelle had made a decision for me. “I don’t have any clothes,” I protested.
Annabelle was flummoxed. “You can have mine.” I imagined fitting into a three-year-old’s clothing and giggled a little bit.
“You can have mine. It’s just one night.” Logan and I shared a glance that I hoped Annabelle didn’t notice. Logan liked it when I wore his shirts back in high school, which I’d carefully hidden under sweaters so my mom wouldn’t notice. I did my own laundry, so she never realized that half of my school wardrobe consisted of my boyfriend’s shirts.
“Okay,” I surrendered. Annabelle cheered. The smile on her face made me feel like it was worth staying the night and going down memory lane with Logan.
“Bath time,” said Logan. Annabelle allowed her father to get her into her own little bathroom. I sat outside in the living room and called my mom.
“Mom, I’m not coming home tonight.”
“What’s wrong?” she immediately asked.
“I’m at Logan Simpson’s house and his kid went to the ER.”
“Oh my goodness, is she okay?”
“She has a stomach bug and wants me to stick around for a while.”
“Do you need me to run over an overnight bag?”
“No, I’ll be fine.”
“I’m only a few miles away.”
“Why do you know where he lives?”
“His mom showed me pictures from his housewarming party,” my mother replied evasively.
“Mom!”
“Okay, I kept tabs on him when he came back and had that cute little Munchkin. Romi ran out on them.”
“I know,” I sighed.
“She’s not half the girl you are, sweetheart.”
“Mom, I live in New York.”
“You could move back.”
“I have a publishing business.”
“You can run it from anywhere in the world.”
“I have a life there,” I reminded my mom.
“Indiana is a good place to raise kids.”
“Mom, I’m not even dating anyone.”
“I know what an overnight stay means.”
I was blushing, my face hot. “Mom! Annabelle invited me over, not Logan.”
“I just hope you’re still taking your birth control pills.”
“I don’t want to talk about this,” I said, trying to end the conversation. I was actually off my birth control pills because I didn’
t have anybody in my life. My business had eaten up most of my time and attention for years. I still went to happy hours once in a while, but as everyone started having kids, they had less time for me. And I was happy enough clicking Like on Facebook to keep in touch with my old high school and college friends. We had all scattered from Indiana. Very few of my high school friends still lived in the Indianapolis area. There were exciting opportunities for young people who wanted to move out and live in bigger cities. NYC offered me chances that I never would have had back in Indiana. Living in the hub of where publishing was centered had helped me make the connections to kickstart my own publishing business. I had mentors in NYC who would never move anywhere else. I’d been lucky that publishing was a female-dominated industry in many ways; there were plenty of women who saw their younger selves in me and weren’t too snobby to help. Like most other New Yorkers, I didn’t cook much. I had high school friends who had babies and kids entering kindergarten at this point, content to be a stay-at-home wife who kept dinner on the table and carried monstrously huge diaper bags instead of the petite clutches I normally carried around.
“I’m just saying that you should pick up Plan B if you’re staying over,” warned my mother. “I know how you and Logan can get carried away.”
“Stop, Mom,” I groaned. My mom knew about my youthful indiscretions with Logan. They had been so long ago. It was true that some part of my analytical brain turned off when I was with Logan. He made all my worries and cares disappear when his mouth was on mine. He’d always been like that. I wasn’t sure why he hadn’t taken the full ride at IU that I’d taken. Instead, he chose to pay out-of-state tuition at U of M. I was sure that in some parallel universe, he stayed in Indiana and we’d already gotten married and had a few kids. I imagined a little boy with Logan’s smile and my hair gnawing on Cheerios. I smiled at the thought. “I’m here for Annabelle.”
“You keep telling yourself that, sweetheart.” I could hear Mom’s smile in her voice. “Be safe.”
“Night.” I clicked off the phone. My dad would’ve had more to say about the time I was wasting on Logan, who already had a kid and lived in a different state than I did. My parents were practical people. At this age, I could spend the night wherever I wanted. The gentle ribbing I got from my mom was nothing compared to the suspicious questions I would’ve gotten from my dad, though.