Page 120 of The Woman in the Hollow
It wasn’t until we didn’t turn in the direction of any of Lucky’s pizza places that I felt my interest piquing.
“There better be pizza, whatever this is,” I grumbled, My stomach did the same.
“Would I ever under-promise on pizza?” Dante asked.
He was right.
I knew I could trust him.
Because as we pulled into Matteo’s event venue, where everyone was lying in wait to surprise me with a baby shower, there was a whole wall lined in tables full of different pizzas.
“I married the best man in the world,” I told him, leaning my head into his side.
Dante - 12 years
“That’s a lot of noise,” I declared as I walked in the front door of our house.
To be fair, in our home, it was always a lot of noise.
That’s what happened when you started having kids and just couldn’t stop.
“Help!” someone called from deep inside the house, making my heart gallop as I flew down the center hallway and into the kitchen.
I guess I’d expected Hazel.
But it was Hannah, standing in the chaos all around her: art projects strewn over the island, half-eaten food on the table,sauce simmering too high and spitting all over the backsplash, kids everywhere.
“Hannah, what’s going on?” I asked, snatching up a toddler as I made my way to the oven to turn the sauce down then give it a stir before it burned.
“I dropped in for a visit,” Hannah said, wiping some spilled juice before it could waterfall off the counter. “My sister had her head in the toilet and the whole house was going to hell.”
We hadn’t meant to get pregnant again. But there’d been a period between when the vasectomy fully ‘kicked in,’ and, well, we had another bundle of joy on the way.
“Shouldn’t they be in school?” Hannah asked, waving toward where one of the kids was dunking a Barbie’s hair into a plate of spaghetti.
Hannah had been true to her desire not to have children of her own. At least not the human kind. She had two spoiled rotten dogs who had a better wardrobe than I did. And, as she hoped, she was kicking ass in the business world.
Her visits were rare.
And she did try to time them for when she could spend the most time with her sister… without the kids interrupting.
“The school is closed for the week for teacher’s something or other,” I said, handing the toddler to Hannah. “Take them outside to run this energy off,” I said.
By the time they came back in, I had the dishwasher stacked, the surfaces cleaned, the meal back on track, and some tea and crackers ready to bring up to my sick wife.
“That was… seriously impressive,” Hannah decided once she came back in.
“I’m a skilled chaos manager at this point.”
“When I really need to do a deep clean of the penthouse, I can just… put the dogs in their crates.”
“Are you suggesting I crate my children?” I asked, smiling.
“Crate, soundproof booth, boarding school…” Hannah teased.
“We’ve learned to like the craziness.”
“Okay. Well, maybe—”
