Page 54 of Beautifully Messy
“Is that why you don’t go home for the holidays? Because she has family nearby?” I keep pushing around the sautéing onions, not daring to look at them standing together, framed in the light sneaking past the windows.
“We left on January 10th.” He pauses, rubs his neck, then says, “I always go home after New Year’s to be with her.”
Something deep and quiet passes between us. Neither of us looks away this time. Only someone who knows what this means would understand. His eyes soften and I imagine mine look equally affected.
“I usually go home for the holidays. But last year my mom and a friend went on a cruise, and I had no interest in being the third wheel, so I came here instead.” He pauses, voice dropping and changing the air. “I’m glad I’m here now.”
His words wrap around me like a slow exhale, curling into every space I thought I’d sealed shut.
Anna fusses again, giving me an excuse I’m grateful for. “She needs to eat.”
I settle on the sectional while James stays in the kitchen tending the chili, and let my head fall back, trying to pull myself together, to lock away everything he’s bringing out.
The music shifts. Maxwell is gone. Tinashe’s lush voice flows like a confession.
He walks toward us, a glass of water in hand. His green eyes study me, memorizing this version of me. A woman completely undone and trying to hold her heart steady.
Not just looking.
Seeing.
I don’t know what to do with it. I’ve never had someone look at me as if I’m the sun and make me laugh like it’s his favorite sound. And it terrifies me morethan Mason’s silence ever could because indifference is safe. You can’t lose what was never given.
But James is offering something real. Something solid. Steady hands. An open heart. The unbearable hope that I could have this. I couldkeepit.
What happens when he sees the truth? When the shine wears off and all that’s left is a thirty-seven-year-old woman with enough baggage to fill this cabin?
“Sydney, can I get you anything else?”
“No, I’m fine.”
His face falls, but he doesn’t ask where the warmth went. He simply sets the glass down and walks away.
I sit nursing Anna, watching him walk back into the kitchen to finish making dinner, and something shifts inside me. This is about the kind of mother I want to be, the kind of world I want Anna to live in. I want her to know that love is steady, not conditional. That tenderness isn’t a trick. That absence isn’t something you excuse with a smile.
Everything I never had as a child.
But what if we start to expect James? What if she gets used to his presence—his steadiness, his goodness—and he leaves? I can’t bear the thought of her learning heartbreak through me, through someone I bring into her life.
Mason may not give us the home I imagined, but at least his absence is predictable. It’s a safer bet than inviting a love that could vanish, shattering her nascent trust.
I can’t risk falling for someone who might give us everything, only to disappear.
With Anna napping in her crib, I find James at the stove stirring chili, relaxed and steady in a way that ignites my indignance.
“Can you stop the act?” The words snap out of me.
James turns, eyes narrowing, reading everything I’m trying to hide.
“No more glasses of water. No more of this album. Stop being so damn considerate.”
Hurt flashes, then something sharper. He isn’t going to stand there and let me yell. “Why? Because your dickhead husband is too selfish to see you need help?”
“No. You don’t get to swoop in and play the hero. What’s happening between Mason and me is none of your business. I can take care of myself. I always have.” I cross my arms, posture automatic. Defensive, like it might keep me from unraveling. “I don’t need your pity. And I sure as hell don’t need your regret for giving up your vacation to babysit me and my kid.”
“You think Iregrettoday?” His nostrils flare, frustration blazing across his face. “There are only two things I regret from this week. You want to hear them?”
“Sure. Whatever.”
