Page 47 of Home Safe

The mixture of gentleness and intensity in his tone gives me a perfect clarity that even my three pages of notes didn’t bring. I want the maximum amount of time with this man.

“Maximum,” I whisper. His eyes spark. “I choose maximize the time.”

Sam and Jason eventually join us upstairs, and Griffin orders pizza (although he cooks chicken and broccoli in the air fryer for himself). Between bites of cheese pizza, Jason bounces back and forth between explainingHarry Potterto Griffin and baseball to me, clearly loving the opportunity to spout off facts about his two favorite subjects.

“There are seven books total? Where are you in the series?” Griffin asks Jason.

“We’re on the third book. It’s taking a while to read out loud, longer than reading it by myself. But I don’t want to read it without Miss Danae,” Jason says. Griffin catches my eye and gives me an encouraging smile as Jason continues, “Hey, why don’t we have the books with thepictures in them? Jackie at school told me there areHarry Potterbooks with pictures.”

“Oh, there are, but . . .” I hesitate to answer, not wanting to admit the truth out loud in front of Griffin.

Although my parents paid for my undergrad, once they realized I wasn’t going along with their life plans, they cut me off. I’m still paying off the student loans for my master’s degree, which eats a chunk of my teacher’s salary paycheck each month. I’ve been far more concerned with building an emergency fund in the bank than purchasing multiple copies of books, though I’ve coveted the illustrated versions of theHarry Potterseries. However, I do want to model responsible spending to Jason, to set him up well for adulthood someday.

“Well, the illustrated books are pretty expensive, so I’ve never bought them just for myself. Maybe we can look into that as a gift later this year,” I say. “Although probably only the first couple of books for now—the later ones have some illustrations that are a little bit scary. I wouldn’t want you to have nightmares.”

“I wouldn’t be scared! I’m super brave!” Jason says, looking miffed.

“Of course, you are!” I scramble. “I know you’re a super brave kid.”

Sam jumps in to help. “Yeah, look at how you marched right into Camp Wizard the first day, not knowing anyone, and you did amazing at everything!”

Jason puffs up his chest. “I was pretty good, huh?”

We all laugh, and Griffin asks, “Where did you learn so much about baseball?”

“I watched a lot of baseball,” Jason says around a mouth full of pizza. He swallows, and a contemplative look passes over his face. He looks down as he continues, “I mean, on TV. Never in real life. Sometimes my dad would let me watch with him whenever he was home and not . . . out. And on the days he left me home alone, I would sit and watch the games by myself. You were my favorite player to watch on TV, Mr. Griffin! Well, you and Adrian Ortiz. He’s funny.” Jason giggles at the end of his statement, and I know that all three of us adults have emotional whiplash from all of those revelations.

“We’ll have to get you out to watch some games in person this season,” Griffin finally says after clearing the emotion from his throat. “The games are even more fun in real life.”

Jason’s entire face lights up. “Really? That would be the coolest! Can we, Miss Danae?”

“I’m sure we can figure something out,” I reply, feeling conflicted. My desire to go to a baseball game falls into negative territory on the number line. But not only am I dating a baseball player, my new son is clearly obsessed. Mentally, I groan at the prospect of watching baseball, but outwardly I smile and change the subject.

An hour later, Griffin drives us home. The streets are mostly cleared now, meaning school should be back in session tomorrow.

“So, Fireball, when’s your first baseball practice? Are you playing on a team this spring?” Griffin asks, looking in the rearview mirror at Jason.

He perks up in his seat and leans forward. “Am I gonna be on a real baseball team, Miss Danae?”

My gut clenches, and I can’t stop myself from briefly glaring at Griffin before turning to Jason. “We’ll have to talk more about that, bud. I’m not sure that’s something we can add to the schedule right now.” I give Griffin one more side-eye as Jason’s face falls. He sits back in his seat.

Griffin looks at me quizzically and mouths “sorry” before he changes the subject. “What was your favorite part of playing in the snow?” he asks.

Jason perks back up. “Definitely sledding! Or maybe when you hit Miss Danae with the giant snowball,” he says, giggling.

“Hey! You should be defending me, not encouraging him!” I say with mock outrage. Griffin reaches a hand back for a high five, which Jason heartily supplies.

“I’ll be keeping my eye on you two,” I say, using my fingers to motion from my eyes to the two of them.

“I hope so,” Griffin says under his breath. I suppose we haven’t reached the “hold hands in front of Jason” stage yet, but Griffin reaches over to run a finger across the back of my hand. It’s a delicate touch that sends my heart (and hormones) into a frenzy. A touch I’m becoming addicted to after experiencing it just twice. A touch that nearly makes me forget that Griffin put me in a tough position with Jason and his baseball dreams.

There’s absolutely no chance I’m signing Jason up for baseball this spring. I can’t handle one more thing right now.

We pull into a parking space in front of our townhouse. The lot hasn’t been cleared of snow very well yet, which makes the clearance of Griffin’s Jeep an advantage. He helps Jason out of the car and grabs the booster seat to transfer to mine. I unlock our front door, but Jason suddenly turns and wraps his little arms around Griffin’s waist in a tight hug.

“Thank you for letting us come play, Mr. Griffin. I had so much fun today,” he says.

Griffin makes brief eye contact with me before leaning down to return Jason’s hug. “Any time, Fireball. You’re gonna need a lot of practice if you’re ever going to beat me at Mario Kart.”

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