Page 112 of For Eva

I looked up, my mind still on Eric. “Hmm?”

“Your phone,” he said, pointing at it.

“Oh, nothing. Just a text.”

He nodded. “So, um, how are you?”

“I’m good. How are you? How’s—”

“We’re good,” he answered, cutting me off before I could say his girlfriend’s name. It was something he’d done since he’d first told me about her. As if hearing her name coming from my mouth made him feel some sort of inexplicable culpability he didn’t have time to think through. “She’s out with her mom doing some last-minute shopping for the, uh…stuff.”

“Right,” I said, looking at my phone as it pinged again.

Eric:How is pregnant girlfriend? Super pregnant?

Me:Out shopping for “stuff,” which appears to be code for baby. He can’t even say it. Oh, the guilt.

Eric:Make him say it. And take a picture so I can see his face when he does.

“Ha!” I glanced up at Aaron’s tilted head, then quickly coughed and patted my chest. “Sorry.”

“Is that Denise?”

I shook my head and cleared my throat, trying not to laugh. “No. Just another…friend.”

“Kate?”

I lifted my chin and narrowed my eyes at him. “Why does it matter?”

“It doesn’t.” He flicked his gaze away. “Anyway, it was such a nice day yesterday, and I asked Miles if he wanted to go outside and throw the ball around. But he told me he doesn’t want to play baseball this year. Did he mention that to you?”

Another ping.

Eric:Where’s my picture, woman?

I pressed my lips together in an attempt to hide my smile. “He did. I mean, he didn’t say why, but I have an idea.”

Aaron sat forward in his chair, elbows on his knees.

I sighed and slipped my phone into my purse. “He doesn’t want to be the kid without his dad there. He’s afraid you won’t come to his practices or his games.”

“I…” He opened his mouth, then closed it.

“You what?”

“I come to his practices and games.”

“Aaron.”

“I was there last year.”

“At the beginning you were, but then there was always work or something with Olivia.”

He flinched at the mention of his girlfriend’s name.

“I had that huge case I was trying to settle, and then we found out she was…pregnant.” He mumbled the last word. “I didn’t mean to not be there. Things will be different this season.”

“I think you should be telling Miles this, not me. That is, if you really mean it. Neither one of those boys needs any more disappointments.”

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