Page 11 of Stolen Kisses

I smile at her and kiss the top of her head. “So, what are we going to do today?”

“Can we make mywoompwetty?”

“Sure. Let me make a list for the hardware store and then we’ll go. You go put your shoes on.” I grab anotepadand pencil as Kenny runs upstairs to get herself ready.

* * *

At the hardware store, I have Kenny sitting in the cart as we collect everything we’ll need. I want to put some shelves up in her room and the living room, so she can have some photos of Anna on display. I don’t ever want her to forget her mom. I’ve been telling her stories about Anna from our childhood every night before bed and she soaks up all of the details, asking questions until she falls asleep.

The next stop is the paint and paper aisle. We browse the samples and Kenny falls in love with a wallpaper design of colorful flowersthatlooks like a wild garden. Flowers of all colors, shapes, and sizes grow about halfway up the sheet. It’ll look bright and colorful; just what I was looking for. Icollectsome new white blindsand timber to make shelves to finish off her room. We choose a soft pink color from one of the flowers in the design to paint the remainder of her walls. Then we stop at the store to get groceries before heading home to have lunch.

“I’m so excited. Mywoom’sgonnalook sopwetty.”

After lunch, Kenny helps me to move everything out of her bedroom, so I’ve got an empty space to work with. I should have thought about itbeforewe unpacked her stuff and set her up. We put her mattress on the floor in the spare bedroom and I rig up a tent over the top to make it feel as though she’s camping.

“It’sgonnabe so much fun to sleep in the tent tonight. Will you sleep in there with me?”

“Uhm, I’m not sure we’d both fit.” Itisonly a single mattress and I’ve seen how Kenny sleeps. Sometimes she ends uplyingdiagonally across her bed. I don’t fancy the idea of being poked in the ribs with her toes throughout the night.

A knock at the front door has Kenny running from her temporary bedroom. Following close behind her, I see we have company.

“Hi. We thought we’d stop by to see if Kenny wanted to come to the park with us.” Emma’s standing behind two boys, a hand on each of their shoulders. “Uh, this is Austin.” She looks down at the smaller one with a look of pride on her face. “And this is Lachlan.” She looks across to thetallerboy, equally as proud.

I open the screen door. “Hi. Nice to meet you boys. I’m Theo and this is Kenny, though I think you may have already met this morning.”

Austin nods. “Yeah, we met this morning. Can you still come to the park?” he asks Kenny directly.

Kenny tilts her head up with a hopeful look. “Sure. I’ll just get our stuff. Kenny, go put your shoes on.” I gesture for Emma and her boys to come inside, but they opt to wait on the front porch.

I lock the house and we all head down the street toward the park. Emma’s in the lead with her eldest boy by her side, Austin and Kenny are behind them, chatting away as I bring up the rear. My eyes automatically fall to Emma’s delectable ass, wrapped like a gift in dark blue yoga pants which leave nothing to my imagination. Kenny moves closer to me as we pass the house with the huge dog, which I think may have been an anomaly because we haven’t seen it since that first day.

When we arrive at the park, Austin and Kenny run off together to play, leaving Lachlan with me and Emma. He seems very quiet and shy compared to his younger brother.

“Youwannaplay in the sandpit, Buddy?” Emma guidesthe boyover to the sandpit around the swings. It extends out quite a distance away from the swings, so if he stays toward theedgehe should be safe.

He sits down and begins to smooth out the sand and then proceeds to draw swirly patterns with his fingers. Emma sits along the brick edge which keeps the sand in place, so I figure I may as well sit next to her.

Emma looks across at me with a smile. “Did you like your flowers this morning?”

I smile, remembering how excited Kenny was to present the flowers to me for my birthday. “Yeah, I did. Thank you for letting her raid your garden.”

She chuckles. “She was helping herself when I looked out of my living room window, so I figured I may as well help her out.”

“Shit!” I realize I’ve sworn in front of her son. “Sorry. I shouldn’t swear in front of the kids.”

“That’s okay. He hears worse when he’s with his uncle.” She finishes with a smile, reassuring me she’s not upset with my faux pas.

“I’m sorry Kenny helped herself to your flowers. I did tell her that she shouldn’t pick flowers from other people’s gardens, but she assured me that she had your permission.” I scrub my fingers through my beard. “Not to mention, she managed to sneak out of the house without telling me where she was again!” I huff out.

Emma chuckles. “She probably figured because I helped her, I was giving her permission. Please don’t be mad at her. I didn’t mind at all.” She watches the kids for a few minutes. “Happy birthday, by the way.”

“Thanks. I’d rather forget about it, to be honest.”

“Yeah, it’s getting to that point where I’d rather stop having birthdays.”

“But Mommy, you have to have a birthday every year. You can’t decide to stop having birthdays.” Lachlan says, while still drawing his patterns in the sand. Ithought he was so engrossed in his sand play that he wasn’t listening to our conversation.

Emma reaches forward to brush the hair out of his eyes. “I know,Buddy. There’s no stopping birthdaysorgetting older.”

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