Page 44 of The Southern Thirst Trap

The icy fingers of the thought skate up my back and thread into the hair at the nape of my neck, forcing my head to look back into the living room where Zander is still on the floor. A hot rage follows the path the ice took and burns through me. Would he have come here tonight with the sole intention of meeting Hendricks, take a detour to make out with me in the kitchen, just to leave and fuck another woman? I couldn’t put it past him, that’s for sure.

Did he touch me like he had earlier just for the camera? His tongue had seared a path along my skin, his breath hot and tempting. He hauled me up onto the counter and pulled me against him as easily as if I’d still been in model shape, not forty pounds heavier. Had it been for show because he thought he was helping me, or because he couldn’t keep his hands off of me? How do I know I can trust him now, when I don’t know all of his motivations? I have too many questions and not enough privacy to ask them, so I shut down my wayward thoughts.

“Well, I’m going to ask him,” Mom says, pushing away from the island and making her way into the living room. She settles on the couch and gets Zander’s attention. I watch as they have a quiet conversation I can only catch snippets of over Hendricks’s continued stream of chatter.

Zander looks up and catches my eye. He looks curious, and questioning. When I nod yes, a brilliant smile splits his face and erases the small lines of tension from his skin. I suck in a breath at the way that one smile hits me in the gut, twisting the air from my lungs. It’s a smile of promise, of joy, but also calculation. I don’t trust that smile, no matter how much I want to.

I’m able to finish filming my recipe quickly, taking photos of the finished product once I pull it out of the oven, and cleaning up my production mess while Hendricks commands the attention of his father and grandmother. Dinner is ready shortly after, and I join the group in the living room to let them know.

Zander is on his stomach on the rug, mirroring Hendricks across from him, explaining how an engine works in terms simple enough for a four-year-old to understand. He’s pointing out axles on the Hot Wheels car he holds, showing how the engine creates power to turn the wheels, which moves the car. Hendricks has his most serious and concentrated face on as he follows each step of the process, like he will be tasked with reporting back on it. He’ll likely be telling me about this very thing for days, the little sponge for information that he is.

“Sorry to interrupt the fun, but dinner is ready. Time to clean up and eat, Hendricks.”

“Mo-om,” Hendricks whines, looking up at me from the midst of his toy-strewn play area. “We just finished the track. I can’t clean it up without testing it out.”

“Hmm,” I say, considering him. “How about one race to test it out? But just the one. It’s bath and bedtime after dinner, and you know we don't leave a mess out when you go to bed just in case Alfred decides to eat your toys.”

“Fine,” he grumbles, already hunting for his racing vehicle of choice.

“Alfred?” Zander asks as he pushes himself up into a sitting position.

“The robot vacuum. It runs in here overnight and we’ve had a few Lego-related disasters and meltdowns thanks to Alfred.” My explanation sounds so childish, but Zander nods in complete understanding.

“Robot butlers aren’t the best at knowing what is a mess and what is a perfectly good track, right, Boss?” he asks.

“Right, Zan Man,” Hendricks answers back, having secured his car.

I look between them. “Nicknames?”

“That one is way better than the previous option,” Mom supplies for the guys, who are crawling across the rug to the start of their track, which covers a large portion of the space. “Hendricks kept trying to rhyme his name with a silly song, so he had Zander bobander banana fana bo bana before they shortened it.”

“Didn’t roll off the tongue quite so easily,” Zander supplies. “Alright, Boss, this is the race that will cement your status as the best track builder in the world. Let’s make it good.”

“Three, two, go!” Hendricks calls excitedly, pushing his car down the track with all the noise and engine sounds he believes required. He continues along the track, weaving through block towers and around toy obstacles. When he completes the track, he launches the car off the rug and throws his hands in the air.

Zander rushes over and scoops him up, twirling him around, and making crowd noises as my little boy laughs and squeals. “And that, ladies and gentlemen, was the best race, on the best track, in the best place, we have ever seen,” he says in a mock announcer voice before setting Hendricks down.

“Best. Track. Ever!” Hendricks says, jumping up and high-fiving Zander’s outstretched palm.

“Absolutely, little dude. Now, how fast do you think we can break it down and put everything away?” Zander asks, like he’s issuing a challenge. “I bet I can get all the towers put away before you can clean up the tracks.”

“No way, I’m faster,” Hendricks says, dropping to the rug and pulling pieces of track up as fast as his little hands allow.

I watch as Zander smiles indulgently, giving him a head start, then he also drops to the rug and grabs fistfuls of blocks to stuff back into their containers, and the race is on.

Hendricks is a good kid, but he isn’t normally as interested in the clean-up portion as he is in the mess-making part. I never expected Zander, of all people, to be good with kids, but he’s just proved he can not only play with a child, but also incentivize him to clean up without argument. I cross my arms and tilt my head as I watch the two of them now, scrambling around on all fours, Hendricks giggling as Zander blocks him from a section of track by collapsing his body on top of it.

An ache blooms in my chest as all the things I wished I could have play out in front of me, and I still can’t fucking trust any part of this, no matter how much I want to.

twenty-five

Zander

Harlowe’sdinnerisdamngood, but it’s no surprise, given her career direction. The conversation is flowing and easy between me and her mother, Lily, and Hendricks seems intent on holding my attention when he isn’t taking neat bites of his dinner at his mom’s insistence. So why do I feel the draft of an icy wind from Harlowe? She’s perfectly civil, but she’s avoiding my eyes, and only speaking to me when she has to.

Haven’t I shown her I want to be here, with them both? Can’t she see I’m trying my best to be the person her kid needs? Why isn’t that thawing the frozen tundra of her acceptance of me into her life?

“I’ll take care of bath and bedtime. Zander, why don't you help Harlowe clean up?” Lily says, when Hendricks announces he’s done with dinner.

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