Page 6 of Ewing

“Get real. We live in a big house with lots of stairs and bedrooms. Dad said that we have all that room, so we might as well enjoy it. We also have a pool, but it’s not open right now. Dad’s been waiting until we get swimming lessons before he’ll do that.”

The three little girls talked around her. They were polite and she only just realized that they weren’t related. Not by blood, anyway. As she was getting Patty’s hair pulled up into a messy bun, they were ready to go back to their food. So was she.

Chapter 3

Their breakfast was uneventful after the police took the man away. What he didn’t understand was why Trinity was still here when she could have said whatever she wanted to and left. Finally, he’d had enough of her talking to his children.

“Why are you here?” She told him that she wanted some food. “There are about fifty restaurants around here that would love to sell you something to eat. So again, why are you here?”

“I have to apologize to you.” She looked up at him from her sausage that she’s speared. “I mean, I want to. I was told that I have to fix this, whatever I did to piss you off, but—”

“You owe a quarter to the cursing jar.” She dug out the change purse from her purse and handed Patty the required quarter. “Sometimes I see Dad put a lot of money in the jar, and he goes outside for a while. I think he’s out there cussing up a storm or something.”

“What does the money go to?” Thinking that it was going to be some vacation or something equally extravagant. When she was told, it humbled her in so many ways. “That’s a good idea. Using it to buy Christmas presents for—”

“Don’t be nice to them. You want nothing to do with them.” She looked around the table at the faces that, in the last few minutes, had come to mean a great deal to her. She could tell, too, that he was embarrassed by what he’d said. “What I meant to say was, you don’t need to be nice to them. I accept your apology, and now you can go home.”

“Just like that. You’re going to let me off the hook for saying those nasty things to you.” He told her that since he wasn’t planning on seeing her again, that made it fine by him. For some reason that hurt worse than anything that she’d ever had hurt her before. “Look. You have a life. I get that. But I do as well. I love watching over the kids, loving them, and spending time with them. Could I use a break? Sure but that’s not anything to do with you. It’s my family, and I understand that it’s too much for you.”

She wanted to cry. Never in all her adult life had she wanted to have someone to look at her the way he did his children. Someone to care enough that she wasn’t kidnapped. To be all right with chocolate syrup on their pancakes. Putting down her fork, she looked at him.

“You’re right. I’m sure you hear that a great deal. I don’t mean that to be mean, but you seem to be a man who has his head on straight. I’ll leave you now.” The girls, as one, told her not to leave. “Your father is correct. I don’t want children, and I have a life that doesn’t involve getting married. Thank you.”

She was nearly to the door, thinking that she was going to make it to the street before her tears fell when someone, a very short someone, put their arms around her legs. Looking down at the little girl, her name was Beth, she had found out she asked her what she was doing.

“Don’t leave us. Please?” She told Beth that she had to go back to work. “Nothing is more important than family. We’re ‘pose to be a family. You can’t just leave us here with our dad. You have to be his wife, so we have a momma.”

She was ready to bolt, thinking that there was no other way that she was going to be able to get out of this with her dignity or some semblance of it when Ewing was standing there. He asked her politely to please come back to the table with them. Nodding, she let the tears flow then, there was no hope for it.

“Don’t cry, please?” He handed her a tissue and realized that it was used. “I’m going to buy stock in tissues when I get home. They’re good for all kinds of things.” Digging through his pockets, he found one that looked clean and handed it to her. “I think that the little packets of them are better. And softer, too.”

She had no idea why that was suddenly funny to her. As she was wiping at her tears, she walked back to the table. The kids were still eating, but the smiles that were all around the table were worth every second of her pained heart. Trinity realized that she wanted this, the home life, more than she did anything. Looking at Ewing as he cut up pancakes into small blocks, she realized that at some point in her coming here and nearly leaving, she’d fallen in love with Ewing.

It was the way that their kind did things. Fast and hard. But she was still leery about what to do with her life. She just couldn’t be a full time mom and feel like she was making anything of her life. She kept thinking about her parents. They were forever bickering about the smallest little things.

“Do you ‘pose they have whipped cream?” Trinity asked Rachel if she wanted some. “Nah, I was just wondering. They seem to gots everything else a body would want on pancakes.” She had to agree with her. They did have a large selection of toppings for pancakes and waffles.

The conversation flowed nicely, even between her and Ewing. He’d answer one of the kids like he wasn’t bothered by their constant questions and she did the same in turn. It wasn’t until the waitress came by to ask about refills that she realized that the kids were sharing a single order of pancakes. It ticked her off a bit that he was taking advantage of the place by not paying for everyone an order.

“I think we’re about finished here, Milly. Make sure you charge me for each of the kids. It couldn’t have been easy waiting on all of us. But you did a wonderful job of it.” He looked at her as if he knew what she’d been thinking. “I really wish that you’d start thinking positively of me instead of thinking that I’m taking advantage of people. Believe it or not, I’m not a bastard, nor am I cheap.”

When he picked up Billy, telling the girls he was going to go and change the baby to not move, Trinity looked around the table at the little girls who had a large piece of her heart already. It was Harper, the most outspoken of the children, who asked her why she was being mean to their dad.

“I didn’t realize that I had been.” She said she had that mad look in her eyes. “I’ll have to work on that then. I wanted to ask you if you would help me with that, but I’m afraid that you’ll be too harsh on me, and it’ll upset me.”

“I won’t be hard on you.” She looked at her sister, sort of looking for support, she thought. “I’ll help you because you are trying. Dad said that if you mess up on accident, that’s all right. But don’t do it again. Like when I spilled my milk because I didn’t want him to help me. I learned that the jug is too big for my little arms, and I need help. He said asking for help is a good thing to learn.”

“I know that’s easier said than done, asking for help. You don’t want people to think that you’re some kind of wimp or something like that.” She was going to have to keep watching her language. Ewing would never forgive her if he had to explain what the word pussy meant.

By the time Ewing returned with a much happier Billy, she’d paid the bill and tipped well. When he asked her, quietly how much she had tipped, she wasn’t sure what he meant. But she did understand when he pulled out two one hundred dollar bills and put them on the table.

“For the other mess, too.” She’d forgotten about that, having so much fun with the kids and Ewing was a nice distraction for all the bad things that were going on in her life. “You’ll come with us, right?”

By the time they were outside, she couldn’t believe how beautiful the day had gotten. Since the girls wanted to walk around a bit, she was willing to take their hands in hers to help out. Billy had a front carrier thing that Ewing was wearing, and Trinity laughed when Patty called it the Billy pouch. Apparently, Ewing was reading the Winnie the Pooh series, and they had learned about Kanga and her son.

There were plenty of shops on this end of town, but they were more centered on the townspeople rather than the touristy people. As soon as they entered the shop that had beautifully displayed items from the area, she thought she could spend her entire check in the store and not get everything that she wanted.

“We have this one in our house. The bathroom stuff is smelly, but in a good way. Dad brought us here when we first lived with him. To get us bathroom junk.” She looked around and then motioned for Trinity to move closer to her. “That lady at the counter is trying to steal him away by telling himthat she’d love to get to know us. Like someone wants to get to know us when there is a big handsome man around.”

---