Page 5 of Enchanted in Time
“Hannah has another kid. Three children!” Lena explained, obviously relieved at the opportunity to change the subject. Charlotte and the other two looked at Hannah like she had broken an agreement.
“Three children? Isn’t that a bit much?”
“Three is the new two!” Hannah countered with a wink. She wasn’t about to let some self-satisfied Barbie doll put her down!
“Sure, if you can afford it. And where is your husband? At work?”
Lena hesitated and looked anxiously at Hannah, who was tensing up beneath her cheerful facade. Why did this topic always have to come up?
“No, I’m a single mother.”
“A single mother with three children?” gasped Charlotte. “That can’t make it easy to find a new guy!”
“No smart man would go for that,” one of the others chimed in.
What were these two thinking? Shouldn’t women—especially mothers—always stick together, no matter where they came from, what they did for a living, or whether they were in a relationship?
Hannah fixed her gaze on the two women with a venomous look. “Well, who knows? Maybe somewhere out there is a Prince Charming who’s waiting just for me.”
The three women laughed—probably at Hannah’s expense, but she was above it. What exactly did Lena see in these pompous chickies? She sneaked a peek at the clock. When could she leave without being rude?
“I hope those three at least all have the same man as their father!” Charlotte was watching Hannah’s expression as if hoping for a nice little scandal.
How many times before had people reacted condescendingly when they’d found out that she was a single mother of three? She’d grown a thick skin. Very thick.
Hannah gave them a cocky look and winked at them all. “Not at all. I don’t even know which three are their fathers!”
None of the women reacted until Lena intervened. “That was a joke! Of course, all three children have the same father!”
With that, the three women burst into hyena-like laughter.
“Speaking of which, how is Matthew doing?” Lena asked, attempting to steer the conversation in a different direction.
“He works a lot—you know how it is. His law firm is becoming more and more successful. By the way,” Charlotte said, turning back to Hannah, “if your ex isn’t paying you a decent amount of alimony, my husband’s law firm also handles family law. They can help you!”
Right at that moment, Emi and Leon came running up. “Mommy, the ladybug has three spots. Does that mean it’s three years old?”
“That’s right, sweetie.”
Charlotte leaned forward a little. “God, aren’t you two cute! And I’m sure you see your daddy a lot anyway, right?”
Hannah’s heart was pounding harder and harder. Her pulse was racing. This was the point when she always wanted to flee, which was why she never went to events like this anymore and why her skin wasn’t as thick as she liked to believe, after all.
Emi’s laughing mouth, with the cute little dimples on the sides, suddenly fell, and Leon looked helpless. “I never saw my daddy at all,” he said in his high little voice, and Hannah could feel her chest tighten, just as it had on that first day.
“Andrew died,” Lena whispered to her friends, whose stunned and sympathetic expressions only made things worse.
If only people didn’t always try to look like they understood. As if they could even remotely feel what they had been through. At times like this, it was almost as bad as that first day. Hannah had hoped she would get used to it, but lately, when her children looked sad because they were reminded that their father would never take them in his arms again, she thought she would go to pieces.
For them alone did she remain strong. For them alone did she get out of bed every morning. Without them, nothing madesense anymore. The children thought they needed their mother? In truth, it was the other way around. Hannah needed her children to help her see her way through all of this.
“And you don’t remember your daddy at all?”
Of course, the worst question of all was promptly directed at Leon and Emi. How much sensitivity did it take to know that you never asked children a question like that?
“I don’t remember him, and before Leon was born, Daddy was already dead,” Emi replied bravely. “But Mommy put up lots and lots of pictures of Daddy so we can say goodnight to him every night.”
“Emi, Leon, look!” Hannah said, trying to distract them. “I think I just saw a dragon land over there with a fairy sitting on its back!”
