“Hm.” Hailey sipped again. “Ooh, it is. It’s hot. So hot.” She made faces and waved a hand near her mouth. “Oh, no. It’s boiling hot.”
The girls laughed, and Paisley dipped a cup into the bath water and handed it over.
“Maybe this one’s better.” Hailey pretended to take a sip. “Ow. It’s burning hot.” Her eyes went wide as she tossed the cup, water arcing across the tub and hitting the wall. The girls cracked up, and he couldn’t help but laugh with them. They continued filling cups and handing them over for several minutes, and not for a second did Hailey lose interest.
Yeah, she’s exactly the right choice for these girls.
When the girls moved on to another game, Hailey reached for a white towel and dried off her face and hands.
He leaned against the counter. “You’re good with them.”
“Oh, well. This part’s not hard.”
He’d never met her mom, but she’d obviously done a great job. “You must’ve had a good role model.”
When her gaze cut away, he knew he’d touched on a sensitive subject. Back in high school, she’d lived with Lindsay for most of senior year. She’d said it was because her mom moved around a lot for work, but maybe there was more to the story.
He’d never really questioned it back then. Given how he’d grown up, what did he know about families? He’d only ever known a dad who filmed two hundred days a year thanks to a massively successful movie franchise. And when his dad was home, he always had friends and business partners visiting.
Cole had bonded with a lot of people who hadn’t stayed in his life all that long. “You’re an only child like me, right?”
“Yep. My mom’s great.”
And yet he heard the hesitancy in her tone. “But?”
“No, nothing bad. We’re just different. And I guess when you said role model, it threw me. I don’t see her like that.” She busied herself by draping the damp towel over the rack.
He hoped for more but didn’t want to push. “I know you moved around a lot.”
She came closer to him. Weirdest thing, but it was like the cells in his body heated up and started moving like bumper cars at a county fair. Crazy because no other woman had the power to excite him like this.
“We did. All the time. And it wasn’t like she’d wait until the start of a school year. If she got a gig, we packed up and left. Don’t get me wrong, if you met her, you’d love her. She’s warm and fun…I mean, everyone loves her. It’s just…” She stood so close their arms brushed. “My mom works hard, and she loves what she does, but in between gigs, it doesn’t occur to her to get a job. She trusts that the universe and her reputation will provide for her. And they usually do. The phone always rings, and she gets another gig.”
“But you need stability.”
“Oh, yeah. In a way my mom can’t possibly understand. She keeps in contact with everyone, so when she needs a place to crash, she just starts texting. I don’t think anyone’s ever turned her down. And it doesn’t bother her a bit when they eventually tell her it’s time for her to move on.”
“Sounds like you hated that part.”
“It was mortifying.” Briefly, her eyelids fluttered closed. “I remember when I was twelve, she met this music executive who had a fancy house in the Hamptons. He only came out on the weekends, so he didn’t mind letting us use the downstairs suite during the week. It had its own entrance, so we didn’t need to go into the main part of the house.” She did it again, closing her eyes briefly as if blocking out a terrible sight. “We hadn’t eaten all day, and I was starving. I remember creeping up the stairs and peering around the dark house, listening to make sure no one was home. It was dead silent, so I went into his refrigerator and scarfed down anything I could find. And there wasn’t much, believe me. An expired yogurt, a jar of pickles, and some sliced cheese with hard edges. And then, I was scooping out ice cream—like being so careful to carve it out in the exact same pattern so that no one could tell I’d taken a few bites—when I heard this deep voice go, What’re you doing? I nearly jumped out of my skin.”
What the fuck was wrong with her mother?Shemight not mind going without food or a roof over her head, but she had adaughter. How could she not feed her little girl?
“I wanted to die.”
“Was the guy a dick about it?”
“You can’t blame him. He’d made it clear to my mom that she could stay a few nights, but she couldn’t come into the main house. I was old enough to know not to go up there and root through his belongings. He pulled the ice cream container out of my hand and asked me to get back downstairs. The thing is, if he’d caught me eating a can of tuna, he wouldn’t have minded. He’d have understood I was hungry. But he thought I was just a kid wandering through his house and randomly eating ice cream. You know? I’m sure he checked his jewelry box to make sure I didn’t steal a watch.”
He nodded like he understood, but he didn’t. Because the man knew Hailey’s mom. He knew if she needed to couch surf, she probably didn’t have money for other things. Like food. He should’ve let Hailey have the ice cream and asked if she needed anything else. Like toothpaste or a fucking sandwich. He should’ve given her a few gift cards.
“So, no, I don’t see my mom as a role model. That doesn’t make her a bad person. It’s just that I need stability and a reliable income.”
“I get it.”This.This was the conversation he’d always wanted to have with her in high school. Maybe he hadn’t been mature enough. He’d hoped they’d talk on their date, but he’d been so damn nervous.
“She never treated me like a child. I was her friend, her partner in crime. Instead of mowing lawns or babysitting, I made money by helping my mom’s clients. So, I’m a boss at pet sitting and watering plants and taking in the mail, but I don’t know the first thing about children.”
“These two make it seem pretty easy.”