She tried to focus on her food, but it didn’t work. Instead, she asked Erin about the movies Josh had bought, “Have you picked what we’re watching yet?”
When he said Finding Nemo, she moaned. “Not again.”
“How many times has he watched it?” Josh asked, finally picking up a slice of pizza—pepperoni; she’d remembered that was his topping of choice from the many times Jamie had ordered in when a game had been on.
“About a million.”
Erin giggled. “Don’t be silly, mommy.” His grin was beaming. “At least ten million, Uncle Josh.”
Uncle Josh snorted. “Then, we just have to make it ten million and one.” His lips screwed in a smile. “I haven’t seen it once, so this is going to be an education for me.”
She snorted. “I wish I hadn’t seen it.”
Erin gasped and gaped at them both. “Mommy, you wish you hadn’t seen Finding Nemo?”
Because it was his favorite, she wrinkled her nose and lied, “Only because I wish I could watch it all over again for the first time.”
Josh’s nostrils flared and he ducked his head to hide a smile. A few seconds later, when Erin, beaming now, began to recount the story to them—inadvertently giving away every single good bit of the plot—Josh caught her eye.
The two of them smiled at each other, but it was the silent communication that passed between them that stunned her.
She’d seen it on TV and in movies. Women who could speak with their partners with merely a blink, an entire conversation passing, discussions and arguments occurring without even a word uttered…
She’d never seen that with her parents who barely tolerated one another. And with Jamie? She’d rarely looked him in the eye, too scared of the repercussions.
Frank and Janice weren’t like that either. Oh, Janice wasn’t too scared to look at Frank. No, she was the kind who would scream down the house. If anything, in that relationship, she could easily imagine Janice tossing something at Frank if he pissed her off in the depths of an argument.
But this? It was the most beautifully intimate moment she’d ever had with someone else, and it made her breath catch.
It gave her, she realized, hope.
Erin jerked her arm, jolting her from the moment, but she didn’t mind. Though it felt like she’d had an epiphany, a truly groundbreaking moment where the world suddenly made complete and utter sense where it hadn’t before, she turned her attention to her son and to her lover.
Tonight, she didn’t want it to be anywhere else. Not in the past or the future, just the present, because from where she was seated, the present was exactly how she wanted it to be.
It couldn’t have been any more perfect.
Chapter 17
Josh
Cocking a brow at Samantha, he watched her study the red bell peppers like it was a calculus textbook. Josh was sure he’d seen people taking their Finals focus less on their papers than she was on the produce in her hands.
“What are you doing?” he asked her quietly.
“Getting the good ones.” She spoke so absentmindedly that he couldn’t help but be amused.
“They all look good to me.”
“Ah, but I want perfection,” she teased.
Having seen her inspect the tomatoes, lettuce, and watermelon in the same way, he could attest to her high standards.
Clucking his tongue as he leaned against the cart, he asked himself what the hell he was doing in a grocery store.
Normally, Josh paid people to come to places like this for him, but, for whatever reason, Samantha had insisted.
He wasn’t sure why she’d wanted him to come along, but he found himself in the unmistakable position of wanting to please her, so even though it bewildered him to be here, he was in the store nonetheless.