Page 111 of When We Met

Everything about Texas calls to me. I even like the wind. I could do without the cow shit smell, but it’s a reminder that this is home now. I’m raising my family here and wouldn’t have it any other way.

Speaking of cow shit, my poor little boy is now very familiar that you do not play in the piles of stinky poo. “Yuck,” he says, staring at his hands.

“I told you not to touch it,” I remind him, only to have him fling it from his hand onto the bathroom wall. Freakin’ toddlers. He just turned two, and Bishop tells me every day, Austyn’s the spitting image of Barron when he was little. I don’t doubt that for one second.

“Grandpa Johnny’s here!” Camdyn announces, peeking her head around the corner, seeing his truck pull down the driveway.

I lift Austyn out of the tub. “No more playing in poop.”

He nods, but I’m not convinced he won’t get into it again. I tell him daily not to pull Sev’s hair, but he does it anyway. Even when she threatens to turn him into a girl.

Wrapping Austyn up in a towel, I see Johnny on the porch talking to Camdyn. It wasn’t until Austyn was born that Barron finally came around to the idea that they should be allowed to see Camdyn and Sev. It wasn’t my decision to make, but I gave him my support. He told the girls about their real mom, though I’m not sure they understood because Sev looked at him like his head exploded and he was speaking some other language.

She said, “You crazy. Kacy’s my mom.”

And they didn’t talk about it again. But, they have a relationship with Tara’s parents now. It’s nothing like they have with Barron’s parents, but I think it makes him feel better that he’s not denying them their grandchildren.

Tara, she married that actor she’d been dating, and guess what? They’re divorced already. No surprise. She hasn’t spoken to Barron in years, other than the day she signed over her parental rights, so I could legally adopt the girls.

I haven’t spoken to my mom in two years, and my dad, he came out to Texas shortly after Austyn was born, but I don’t see him often. Not like Barron’s family, who I spend every single day around and love it.

Lillian and me, we’re best friends and talk every single day. She and Morgan, got married, and adopted a daughter about a year ago. Brenna’s three, and if you didn’t know she was adopted, you wouldn’t because she looks identical to Lillian. Long blonde curls, blue eyes, and a fiery personality to match.

Poor Austyn. He’s the only boy among the Grady kids, but let me tell you, he holds his own. Last week he cut Camdyn’s hair with scissors. The week before, set a pile of ants on fire because they bit him. Where he got a lighter, I don’t know. But that’s how Austyn defends himself. Eye for an eye. Like Bishop said. Spitting image of his father.

“Mom!” Camdyn yells, coming around the corner and into the bathroom. “Sev stole my tooth again!”

Camdyn, being almost eight now, has started losing her baby teeth. Sev, well, she thinks…. Okay, I don’t know what our dark-souled baby thinks. Other than she’s going to cast a spell on someone.

Drying off Austyn, I set him on the floor only to have him take off buck-ass naked through the house. “Where is she?”

She flings her arms up in the air. “I don’t know.”

It’s then I notice what she’s wearing. Crop top and cut-off jean shorts that Barron will probably destroy when he finds them. I certainly didn’t buy them for her and I know Barron didn’t. “Where did you get those?”

She looks down. “Focus. My tooth. She steals all my stuff and now she’s stealing my stinkin’ teeth.”

“Sev!” I spot our little monster running full sprint toward the door with the tooth in hand and her spell book in the other. “Give that back to her.”

“I don’t gots her dumb tooth!” she yells back, which is a lie.

There’s no catching her and I’m not convinced she won’t bury it in the backyard for some weird voodoo magic she’s working on. Sev’s in school now and though the other kids think she’s weird, I tell her daily, “You’re enough. It’s okay to be different. You belong.” Even though I worry someday, she’s going to cast a spell and set the world on fire. I tell her because I didn’t hear that growing up and I know she needs to.

I find Austyn outside in the driveway, cowboy boots on and nothing else. He’s also peeing on my succulents I planted last week. No wonder they’re dying. “Austyn! No.”

He turns his head, still peeing and urinates on Johnny’s leg in the process.

I slap my hand over my mouth. “Oh my God, I’m so sorry.”

Johnny laughs it off. “Don’t worry about it, darlin’.”

Austyn comes back over to me, his boots dragging in the gravel. “Go put some clothes on.”

He scowls up at me. “No.”

Ah, yes, His favorite words. “Austyn Barron Grady… you better get your butt inside.”

He doesn’t. Instead, his sits down in the dirt and pulls my succulents out of the ground.

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