Page 1 of Broken Dreams
one
GRADY
“Let’s go, Jett, you need to get dressed.” I huff as I try to convince my three-and-a-half-year-old to put his freaking shirt on.
He stands there, arms crossed, and shakes his head. “No school.”
“Yes, school, Daddy has to work.”
“No work, Daddy!” He steps back. “Animals!”
It’s been a hard transition moving back to Sugarloaf for both of us. For one, I’m living with my sister, Brynlee, in her three-bedroom house with her version of a petting zoo out back. Which Jett wants to be in all the time.
And I’m caring for the new horses Rowan just purchased while I try to get my flight instructor business going.
Third, I’m doing it on my own and doing a bang-up job at it so far. That’s to say I’m really fucking horrible at this single father shit.
“After school you can go see them,” I negotiate. I never realized toddlers are literally like dealing with a hostage situation. He can argue, pitch a fit, refuse to do what you ask and then, when he hears something he wants, he caves.
Lisa would’ve handled this perfectly.
The thought of my wife whispers through me like the wind, leaving my chest cold as it exits. It’s strange at times when I feel her loss, like now, when our son is being defiant.
“I pet them?”
I sigh. “Yes, Auntie will let you pet them, but only if you get dressed and go to school.”
He sways a few times, as though I just asked him to solve a trigonometry problem, and shuffles toward me. I fight back my grin and slip the shirt over his head. Once he’s dressed, he leaps forward, wrapping his arms around my neck. I catch him with a laugh and hold him tight. Some days I don’t know how I do this, the ones where he’s never happy, throwing himself on the floor over a bath, or sick. Then these moments remind me why it’s all worth it.
Why giving up the life I worked so hard for, the found family I had in the navy, the way it felt to be a hero in some way didn’t matter because Jett needed me more.
He needed me to be the man to walk away from it and give him a home.
“Love you, Jett,” I say and then kiss his head.
“Love you, Daddy!”
And then he’s off, running out of his room, no doubt to try to escape to the barn where Brynlee is feeding her menagerie.
I push up, groaning as my knees creak, and go after him.
There I find him, in my sister’s arms, squeezing her cheeks together. “Hello, Grady,” she mumbles with her mouth smooshed.
“Morning, Brynn.”
She tries to smile but can’t. “Jett, you’re squishing my face.”
He laughs. “Auntie sounds funny.”
“She looks funny too,” I joke, unable to stop my older-brother instinct to piss her off from rising.
Brynn widens her eyes and puffs her cheeks, forcing him to let go, which causes him to giggle more.
That laugh, so much like his mother’s. Lisa laughed with her whole heart. It was goofy and loud, but it was beautiful and free. I wish I could hear it again, even just once, so I could truly memorize it.
“You look funny and smell,” Brynn attempts to insult me.
I roll my eyes and grab Jett from her arms. “Good comeback.”
