Page 99 of Almost Always

“Eyes too big for his stomach, huh?” he said as he joined them, setting the wine in front of her.

“Honestly. I made a deal, though. He has to eat half of everything and only then were we allowed to put it on our plate. Right?”

“Yes,” his son said with a mouth full of mashed potatoes.

She crossed one leg over the other and shifted in her chair so she was angled towards him. He clinked their drinks and took a sip of his beer as he watched her. Her eyes moved over the room, taking in all the people around them, before she smiled at him.

“Did you do this a lot in New York?”

“I attended one and left before they served dinner.”

“Why?”

“I was bored. Didn’t have a beautiful date either.”

She smiled and leaned into him. “Well, we’re glad you invited us tonight. He might not say it to you, but Cal was so excited that he got to dress up and go out with his dad.”

His heart clenched at the sincerity in those words and he glanced at his son. Cal was his whole world and had been his only focus for the last nine years. Everything he did, he’d thought of his son first. Including bringing Daisy into their lives.

“Back then I was worried I’d lose him in a place this big.”

“He’s a smart kid. He’d have found his way back to you.”

“I know. But I’m a worrier by nature.”

She laughed. “Oh, I remember.”

“I wasn’t that bad,” he countered and she laughed harder. “Give me one instance.”

“Just one, hotshot? I’ve got tons.”

“I just want one.”

Shifting so that she was facing him fully, she said, “There was a party that summer before I left and you didn’t like or trust the people hosting it. You kept trying to convince me to change my mind, but I refused. I wanted to go because it was the first party I was invited to. And you showed up as my bodyguard the whole night.”

He grunted at the memory, remembering what the assholes were saying, how they were looking to see which one of them could ‘pop her cherry’. He never understood why she wanted to go to that party when everyone there constantly picked on her. Thankfully, by then his classmates had graduated and left, but the ones who remained weren’t any better. As her bodyguard, he’d heard them whisper about her, saying horrible things that he was sure would undo all the work she’d done to deal with her eating disorder.

Protecting her was the one job he was good at and he wasn’t going to fail.Except I did.

“I would do that again in a heartbeat,” he said, smiling when she did. “Even back then, I hated it when you weren’t with me.”

“You could have told me.”

“And face rejection, no thanks.”

She rolled her eyes. “I would have thrown myself at you. Much like I did the night before we left.”

“I do wish I’d said or done something more that night.”

“I think we didn’t because it wasn’t our time,” she admitted with a sigh.

“This, Daze, is absolutely our time. Okay?”

She flashed him a beautiful smile and nodded. He leaned in to kiss her as the sound of scraping chairs echoed aroundthem. Pulling back, he nodded at the other firefighters and their partners at their table. As the speeches started he adjusted his chair so that he was facing forward, but made sure to keep her close by draping one arm over her lap. His fingers brushed against her calf and she put her hand over his, guiding it below the soft material of her dress.

Eventually, the conversation at their table resumed. They tried to include Cal, but it was clear his son was focused on his food and doing justice to the pile. Daisy, on the other hand, engaged when she could and told everyone about her flower shop. He listened the whole time, proud of how much she’d achieved and what she’d been able to do with her life. At one point, Cal said he was too full and before he could get up, Daisy was on her feet suggesting a walk.

When his family returned, he could see that his son was fading. So he left the two of them there as he went to get food. When he came back, Cal was lying across two chairs, his head in Daisy’s lap.

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