Page 67 of Under One Roof

I feel so foolish to still be sulking all these hours later, but I can’t seem to make sense of any of my emotions. I’ve pretty much been sitting here since I dropped the kids off this morning.

“What happened?” he asks. “When you texted last night, I figured everything was fine. You were sorting photos or something.”

Wordlessly, I stand to retrieve the gift bag and handful of frames and pictures I put together and hand them to him. Then I slump right next to him, leaning against his side with my feet under my butt. He lifts his arm so I can snuggle even closer as he sets the photos down on his lap, lifting each one up at a time.

The first is a picture of Griffin with Logan and Grace as toddlers, both of them holding on to each of his pinkies, all of them walking toward whoever was taking the picture. It’s adorable.

The next one is Griffin and his siblings at some kind of picnic when they were younger. I point to the little boy. “That’s Roman, I assume.”

He grunts an affirmative and moves to the next one, him in a cap and gown, an unsmiling high school graduate. So serious even then.

He sets down the photos then opens the gift bag, pulling out the four frames of a photo I reprinted. It took a bit of research to find a place that would restore the picture and blow it up from a 4x6 to the 10x12s I got made for Griffin and his siblings. I thought it was too beautiful for them not to have.

Griffin releases a gruff sound from the back of his throat when he sees his mother, a bright smile on her face. She must have been in her twenties, leaning her chin in her hand, a book open in front of her, and almost out of frame with the window directly behind her, the sunshine backlighting her.

And the only reason I knew it was his mother is because of what her children look like when they smile. Though a rarity, they have the same exact smile as Violet Stone.

“I hope it’s okay that I framed this. I thought you’d like it. You and your brothers and sister. I made one for each of you. I don’t know how much they have of your mom, but…” It seems silly now, maybe even stepping over the boundary. Assuming. “I’m sorry.”

“No.” He sniffs and clears his throat. “It’s perfect. Thank you.” He slants his watery gaze to me. “Where did you even find it?”

“They were all thrown together in a box in the hall closet upstairs. You probably forgot you even had them since they were behind a bucket of cleaning supplies.”

“Definitely forgot,” he says, and I drag my fingertip over his mother’s smile. From the snippets of his family I’ve gleaned, I know his father is not in his or his siblings’ lives and that their mother passed away from a stroke a long time ago…fifteen years or so. I also know Griffin well enough to recognize that these stuffed-away photos represent how he stuffs away his feelings. He doesn’t want to face what he feels. What he lost.

His beloved mother.

“She was beautiful.”

“She was.” He inhales audibly and raises his chin toward the ceiling, his voice like gravel when he quotes, “‘Doubt thou the stars are fire; Doubt that the sun doth move; Doubt truth to be a liar; But never doubt I love.’”

“Shakespeare?”

“Hamlet.” He lowers his gaze to mine, his eyes rimmed red. “That line was her favorite. When she’d write letters to me, she’d sign them, never doubt I love.”

I gasp, making the connection of the ink I’ve noticed on his ribs, a long line in delicate cursive, almost like someone wrote it on his skin. “That’s your tattoo.”

He nods. “In her handwriting.”

Below it are the kids’ initials with their birthdate, and I shift away to lift his T-shirt, finding the quote, tracing the letters with my fingertips, my eyes burning with his shared lingering grief. I swallow the lump in my throat. I don’t know what it feels like to lose a parent, but I know what it feels like to mourn the loss of what could have been. I also know how I’ve come to feel about Logan and Grace in such a short amount of time, and if it is one-third of what Violet felt about her children, I can understand the sentiment. There is nothing more true. No doubt about my love.

“We all have them,” he tells me quietly. “Me, Taryn, Roman, and Ian. We all have tattoos for her. It was one of the few things we did all together after.”

I don’t know what else to say besides, “She loved you so much. Still does.” Then I cup the back of his head and kiss him, comforting him as best I can. He sets down the photos next to him and hauls me into his lap, skating his hands under my T-shirt, warming my skin. I mold my hands to his jaw, licking into his mouth. His tongue tastes faintly of coffee, reminding me that I haven’t had anything to eat yet today. My stomach growls, and so does Griffin. “You didn’t eat today?”

I shrug. “Forgot.”

“Let’s get some protein in you.” He stands with me in his arms—I’ll never not love that—and sets my feet on the floor, tugging me to the kitchen, where he gets busy building chicken and hummus wraps, setting them on plates with my favorite salt-and-vinegar chips and some mixed berries. I accept the plate he offers me and settle across the island from him. We stand, eating in silence, watching each other, and it should probably be awkward, his dark gaze on me while I stuff my face, but it’s not. I don’t mind.

Especially because it seems to make him happy I finish everything. Once we’re both done, he asks, “What’s got you so upset you forgot to eat?”

I pick at the edge of the plate, trying to gather my thoughts. “Dahlia called me yesterday.”

Griffin furrows his brow. “Okay?”

“She got a record deal.” I say it quietly, trying to keep the bitterness out of my voice. I am happy for her, truly, but it’s hard not to feel a pang of envy.

“And you’re upset about it.”

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