Page 114 of The Infiniteness of Yesterday
HARLOW
“Mom? Mom? Mommy?” Roe chants. “Can I have these?” She holds up a box of sugary cereal.
“No.” I grab a healthier option.
Roe lets out a disgruntled sigh. “You never let me have anything fun.” She stomps her feet extra hard as she walks.
“We just had ice cream sundaes last night,” I say, wheeling behind her with the cart. “What do you call that?”
She flips her hair over her shoulder. “So? That was last night. Today is a new day, Mom.”
“Right,” I mutter. “How could I forget?”
I check my list and continue through the store. After we finish this, I need to drop the groceries off at home and then I’m taking her to my parents’ house. School’s out for the day for a teacher workshop, so my mom offered to watch her after eleven, so I can do some schoolwork myself since I had to take off to be with Roe.
We finally manage to make it to the checkout where Monroe proceeds to finger over the candy selection.
“Please, Mom?” She pouts her lips at me, holding up a pack of M&Ms.
With a sigh, I nod for her to add them to the cart. She happily tosses them in. I turn to eye the rack of magazines and instantly wish I hadn’t.
Spencer dons the front cover, a woman’s arm tucked into his, and he’s laughing at something she’s said. The photo is cropped in a way in which I can’t decipher if it’s been snapped on a set or out in the street.
The headline reads;Rumors are heating up that there’s more than friendship between Spencer Shaw and Matilda Beaufort. Could Hollywood’s hottest star have finally found romance?
My breathing short circuits, a surge of jealousy threatening to pull me under. I have no fucking right to feel this way. Spencer stopped being mine a long time ago. But logic doesn’t always win out over the heart. Besides, he’s been rumored to be in all kinds of relationships over the years. Every month it’s someone they’re speculating he’s with. This is nothing new, and like those, it’s probably nothing.
But the feeling inside me doesn’t go away.
Even as I close my eyes and hear him saying,“When I tell you there’s been no one since you, I mean it.”
“Ma’am? Ma’am?” I’m jolted out of my thoughts by the cashier and realize I’ve zoned out so thoroughly that I haven’t loaded anything onto the conveyor belt.
“I’m so sorry.” I jolt into action, shoving my items out of the cart. My face is flaming red with embarrassment.
I pay and quickly load the paper bags into the cart.
“You seem distracted,” Monroe says in a tone that sounds much more grown than her age.
“Sorry, baby.” I press a kiss to the top of her head as I load everything in the trunk. “You still want to go to grandma’s, right?”
“Well, duh,” she replies, reaching into one of the bags and swiping her M&M’s.
“We’ll go home, and I’ll put the groceries away and then I’ll take you.”
“Okay,” she sighs heavily. “But can you hurry up? I want to go look for seashells.”
I shake my head, but keep my mouth shut.
The grocery store is five-minutes from the house, so it takes little time to get there. While I put everything away, Monroe heads to her room.
“All right, Monster,” I call out. “I’m ready to go.”
Shuffling sounds from her room, and then she comes out, wheeling her small suitcase behind her.
I plant my hands on my hips and cock my head to the side. “Where do you think you’re going? You don’t need a suitcase.”
She rolls her eyes and heaves a mighty sigh like she carries the weight of the world on her tiny shoulders. “I was going to ask grandma for a sleepover.”
