Page 8 of Everlasting Love

“I could tell.” Tristan snickers. “That’s why I thought it would be best if I spoke with them.”

I nod as we each prop ourselves in the back of our vehicle to enjoy our morning snack. I peel my orange while Tristan unwraps a giant piece of chocolate brownie. “Jesus, sure you couldn’t pack a bigger piece of that?” I huff out a laugh and take a bite of an orange segment.

He looks affronted. “I could have brought the whole tray.” He bites off a large chunk and chews, making a big deal about how delicious it is. I’m pretty sure just looking at the sweet treat has added another inch to my damn hips. “So, how was Saturday?” I widen my eyes at my long-time friend, startled that he’s asking me about Shane. How does he know? Am I that transparent?When I don’t respond, he adds, “You know, picking up your stuff from your place.”

Oh,that. It’s a testament to the effect Shane had on me that my mind skipped right over the shit show of the day, passed over Poppy’s concert on Saturday night, and straight to meeting Shane Sutton: bodyguard extraordinaire and setter alight of women’s panties. I blow out a long breath. “It was worse than I anticipated.” Tristan takes another bite of his treat, which I could do with right about now, while I explain how my ex and his whore dumped all of my stuff on the guest bed so she could move in. “And when I say dumped, I mean dumped. Like they carried the drawers into the room and tipped them out. Then took all of my clothes from the hangers, rolled them up, and threw them on the bed.”

His eyebrows shoot up in surprise. “What a fucking dick!”

I nod, finishing off another segment of orange. “I know. I can’t believe I’m actually married to the guy. Can’t wait ’til I divorce his slimy ass.”

The rest of our day goes smoothly, free of medical emergencies—thank goodness. We share some native flora and fauna knowledge with a couple of hikers who are interested in learning more, and then we make our way back to our office to sign off for the day.

The secondI open the front door, my little girl throws herself at me so I bend down and scoop her up. “Mommy, you’re home!” She wraps her little arms around my neck and kisses each of my cheeks.

I burst into laughter at her happiness to see me and rub her nose with mine as I hold her tight to me. “How’s my girl?”

“I be a good girl.” I bet she has. She’s such a sweet little thing; I don’t know how I got so lucky.

Mom comes out of the kitchen with a grin. “Oh my gosh, you didn’t even get completely inside the door.”

“That’s okay. I’m glad my girl is so happy to see me.” I bounce Jasmine in my arms, making her giggle.

“Come see what we pwanted today.” Jasmine releases my neck and wiggles down my body, taking my hand in hers.

“Hang on and let me close the door, then you can show me all the things.”

She releases my hand, running toward the back of the house—probably to put her boots on—while I close and lock the front door. Mom takes my backpack from me and I kiss her cheek.

“How was your day?”

“Busy. I’ll tell you all about it later. Thanks for looking after Jas today.” Mom will never know how much I appreciate her looking after Jasmine for me on the days I work. She’s been doing it for me ever since I returned to work part-time after my maternity leave ended. She manages to do her work from home when Jas naps or is occupied with an activity, and on the days I don’t work, she does her work on site and meets with clients.

“I’ll look forward to hearing all about it, but you’d better get your butt outside before Jasmine star?—”

“Mommy! Where are you?”

Laughter bubbles out of me and Mom. “So impatient, that girl of mine.”

“Sounds like someone else I know.” Mom snickers, giving me a wink. I guess the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree and all that.

I wave to Poppy, who is practicing guitar, on my way to meet Jasmine at the back door. When I look down I notice she has her boots on the wrong feet, but I leave her be. She’ll work out that they feel odd when she starts to walk, or she won’t, it’s notlike it matters. She slides her small hand in mine as excitement lights her little face. Her blue eyes twinkle with the anticipation of showing me what she did today.

We step out of the house and onto the back porch. Jasmine tugs me eagerly down the steps to the raised vegetable beds. “Oh my, you’ve been busy today.”

“We did wots of pwanting today.” She tugs me forward and we stop at the first garden bed. “We pwanted bwoccowi here and cabbage here.” She points at the neat rows, then drags me to the next bed. “We pwanted cawwots and wettuce here.”

Jasmine tries to drag me to the next garden bed, but I stop her. “How many lettuce plants did you plant today?” She shrugs. “How about we count them together and find out?”

“Otay.” We count each tiny seedling together. “… eight, nine, ten!”

“That’s going to be a lot of lettuce.”

She turns to me with wide eyes. “It is. Wucky we wike wettuce.”

“Sure is.”

We spend the next thirty minutes in the garden as Jasmine points out all the seedlings she planted with Mom today, and we spend extra time counting each one. “Woah, we pwanted a wot of pwants today, Mommy.”

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