Page 60 of About That Night

I’m stirring absently.

“Mama!”

“Hmm?” I look at Josiah.

“You need to stir harder. Your butt needs to go like this.” Josiah does some kind of wild wiggling back and forth while his arm wildly approximates stirring.

I laugh. “Maybe you can try.” I hand him the spoon, knowing I’m probably about to get nailed in the face with a flying chocolate chip. Folding the chips in with Josiah is more like he tries to stir, but can’t get through the batter. The spoon gives way, scattering the chips like baking shrapnel.

But I don’t mind a little mess if he’s feeling included.

I pick up my phone and text Hank back.

I can be there in an hour.

You’re an angel.

I have no idea what I am, other than completely confused. I shove a chocolate chip into my mouth.

“Hey!” Josiah says, looking mortally wounded. “You said I couldn’t eat a chip.”

I did. So I pick up another chip and put it to his lips. “Here you go, baby.”

He smiles and my heart melts.

“Okay, my turn to stir.” I take the spoon and give him an exaggerated show of stirring, making him burst out in a childlike cackle that makes me laugh too.

This is what matters. This little man right here. Not who Hank Young is hooking up with.

Chapter Eighteen

Hank

I’m a chef, not a painter. My mother always told me to lean into my strengths, and I should listen to her more often.

There’s paint everywhere. On the floor, on the ladder, on me. Not so much on the wall, where it’s supposed to be, but my shoes are trashed. I washed my hands, but I don’t have a change of clothes, so I just walk carefully as I attempt to clean up the puddle on the floor with rags.

“Hello? Hank?”

“Back here,” I call out.

It’s Chastity. I immediately feel better. I wasn’t sure if she was serious about bringing me cookies, but here she is, smiling at me and holding up a couple of bags. She lifts her right hand. “Cookies.” Then her left. “Whiskey.”

“Thank you. You’re a lifesaver. I didn’t really expect you to bring whiskey, though. I hope you got the cheap stuff.” I know she’s on a tight budget.

“I don’t know anything about whiskey,” she admits. “I asked the guy at the store to give me something inexpensive but not so cheap it’s like drinking pure gasoline.”

“I’m sure whatever you got is fine,” I assure her. “I just need a couple of swigs.” I take the paper bag from her.

Chastity eyes me up and down. I stripped my shirt off to help mop up some of the mess, so my chest is bare but clean. The rest of me must look like a Jackson Pollock painting.

“Oh, Hank,” she says in sympathy. “You’re covered in paint.”

“Wasn’t exaggerating, was I? Watch where you walk, by the way. The floor is still wet here.”

“What happened?”

“Nothing extraordinary. I just had a five-gallon bucket perched on the top of the sawhorse like an idiot. I bumped the edge of the plywood it was on, the sawhorse shifted, plank fell, down went the paint. I had no idea paint could splatter like that.”

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