Page 20 of Crow's Haven
Her eyes meet mine. “You’re everything they could hope for in a parent.”
Her nice compliment hangs in the air between us. It’s thick with emotion in a way I can’t put my finger on. But it isn’t romantically charged in any way. And I’m strangely disappointed by that. I’m trying to see her as a woman who needs my help, but I can’t ignore the fact that she is stirring up all kinds of feelings in me.
The house is still now. The boys are down for the count. Scout doesn’t even stir when I peek in to make sure he’s alright. Chase’s arm is flung over a stuffed dinosaur he’s been hugging since he went to bed.
I find Sharon in the kitchen, sitting sideways at the table, with one leg tucked under her. She’s got a mug of tea in her hands, and her hair’s down again, falling over one shoulder in loose waves.
“Mind if I join you?” I ask.
She glances up and smiles. “Please. It’s your house after all.”
I sit across from her with my own mug, coffee. I’ve reheated it twice already, but it’s still good. “Are you settling in okay?” I ask.
She smiles faintly. “Yeah. I’m still figuring out where the forks go and which one of your kids is more likely to start a food fight, but today went better than I expected.”
I chuckle. “My money’s always on Chase. He’s the one that’s always off the chain. Scout just acts like the foreman.”
She sets her tea down, wrapping both hands around the mug to warm her hands. “I wanted to ask… about Scout.”
“What about him?” I say, more sharply than I intend. I nod slowly.
She hesitates. “It’s just odd how he’s been saying this whole ‘stinking mommies’ thing. It’s cute in a weird, stubborn way, but it’s also coming from somewhere, and I’d like to know where.”
“It is,” I admit, rubbing the back of my neck. “He ain’t trying to be cruel. He’s just built up walls. Took me a long time to figure out where it came from.”
Sharon tilts her head. “Is it about their mom?”
“Yeah. She left when they were almost three months old.”
“But they wouldn’t have any memories of her at this age, right?”
“They don’t. For a long time, they didn’t realize they were missing a mom. Then I started taking them to a local gymthat had a rock wall. The other kids’ moms were obsessed with protecting kids from falling off the rock wall. They didn’t want my boys on the wall without a spotter. I was right there, but they kept telling the boys to wait for their mother. That pissed off Scout to the point that he started not liking women.”
“Oh, wow, I can see that would be annoying.”
“Yeah, it was. When they were three. I think it was the first time he realized the other kids had mommies, but he didn’t.”
“Okay, I’m not sure I’m following you.”
“Chase wanted to know where his mommy was, and Scout told him we don’t need any stinking mommies. But Chase wouldn’t let it go.”
I let out a deep breath and continue. “So, I had to come up with an explanation that would appease a three-year-old. To be honest, I panicked and started rambling about butterflies.”
Her eyebrows lift. “A butterfly?”
I nod, feeling all kinds of embarrassed. “I told him that his mother was like a beautiful butterfly, who needed to be free to fly around and explore and that she was never coming back to us.”
Sharon doesn’t speak for a moment, just watches me, her eyes soft and unreadable. “What happened to her?” she asks gently.
“Their mom?” I take a deep breath and let the words come tumbling out of my mouth. “She was someone I barely knew. A one-night stand, truth be told. We used protection, but nothing’s foolproof. She called me six weeks later, pregnantand scared. Said she was going to keep them, but when it got hard—when the boys came early and needed NICU time—she started slipping. Postpartum hit hard, and the drinking started. Followed by pills, too.”
Sharon says nothing, but I see the empathy and understanding on her face.
Taking a deep breath, I push the rest of the story out. “I tried to help her, but nothing worked, so I paid for a treatment program and took her there myself. Even after holding her hand through the whole admission process, she signed herself out two days later. Instead of coming for the boys, she kept disappearing. It got to the point that she was leaving the boys with neighbors, once with an actual fucking stranger. Still, she was my boys’ mother, so I had to try, for them, if not for her.”
“It must have been harrowing not knowing where she was or if she was even safe.”
“I was. I had to hunt her down more than once. The last straw was finding her passed out in a damn motel.” I look away, the memory still twisting me up.
