Page 6 of Single Dad's Christmas Gift
“What do you think, Mr. O’Connor? Was the movie your favorite?” I can’t help asking when I catch him gazing at us in the rear-view mirror.
“It was EPIC, but I doubt there’ll ever be a better movie than Toy Story.”
He pulls up outside my house.
I smile at the way he said the word epic.
Evie hugs me. I embrace her and caress her hair.
“Goodnight Evie.”
“Night Miss. Shah. See you Monday.”
Fallon opens the door of the truck, and I climb out.
“Thank you so much for the ride.”
“You made Evie’s evening. She loved your company.”
The light of the moon and streetlamp casts shadows on his face. However, I can tell by the sound of his voice that he’s not as guarded as he’s been before. He sounds friendlier.
How the heck am I supposed to resist this version of Fallon O’Connor?
CHAPTER FOUR
Fallon
I’M OUTSIDE LAYLA’S apartment building the next morning, on an errand for Mom to deliver a large donation of knitted goods to one of the nearby towns. Spending more time with the sweet teacher is a terrible idea, but I couldn’t get out of it. I’m standing in for Mr. Potts, a member of Mom’s knitting club, who had an accident and can’t make the trip.
Layla comes out of the building with a picnic bag slung over her shoulder. She’s wearing jeans and sneakers and a red knitted beanie. Her long braid peaks out of the beanie and hangs over her shoulder. A knitted scarf the same color as the beanie wraps around her neck.
She climbs in and I close the door behind her.
“I hope this trip is not a huge inconvenience for you,” she says when I ease onto the road.
I can’t really tell her I’m worried I’ll give in to the urge to stop the car and kiss her lush, pink lips.
“I have the time. Mom’s taking Evie to the mall, so this is nothing. Shall we call each other by our first names? It’s a three hour round trip. It’ll be silly to be formal.”
“Sure.”
She turns to the boxes at the back of the truck.
“You should have picked me up so I could help load the truck.”
“I needed the exercise.”
What I really needed was to spend as little time as possible in her company. I spent a lot of time in the movie theatre studying her instead of watching the screen. In the semi-darkness of the auditorium, it was hard to see clearly however, her reactions fascinated me.
Watching Evie and Layla laugh together and exclaim over the movie made me wonder what it would be like to be a real family. It was the first time I ever thought that.
I’ve never been tempted to marry before. I was so busy being an E. R. doctor and teaching in New York City that I never wanted a wife to feel lonely.
Before Evie, I lived with a woman who was also a doctor. Like me, her work was the most important thing in her life and she just wanted the occasional sexual and dining companion. She couldn’t handle me having Evie. It disrupted our usual pattern. She moved out a week after I took Evie to New York.
Even when I resigned from my job in New York City and moved to Blossom Ford, where I’d be working fewer hours, marriage wasn’t part of my plan. Evie had plenty of female family role models in Mom and Auntie Caitlin. I have eight brothers, so she was already part of a large family.
Layla changed that. And now, I can’t stop wondering. So, yes, time away from Layla would help me sort out my thoughts.
