Page 30 of Unexpectingly Happily Ever After

″Hi, Momma!”

″I’m so proud of you, sweetie! Your first goal. So great!”

By the time I’ve spoken to the three of them and got the highlights of the soccer game repeated several times, I’ve managed to wake up enough to mask the tears in my voice.

I missed hisfirst goal.

″Are you having fun, Momma?” Ben asks finally. “Have you seen Elvis yet? Daddy told us the place is full of Elvises and quarters falling on the ground.”

″Pick up the quarters for us, Momma!” Lucy cries in the background.

″I will,” I promise, fighting back the tears. “All the quarters I find. And I’ll take a picture of Elvis for you, Ben.” How do they even know who Elvis is? What’s J.B. been telling them?

I finally hear J.B.‘s voice over the kids’. “Say bye to Momma now, and go get your snack before it’s all gone,” he orders.

″Bye Momma!” they chorus.

″Have lots and lots and lots of fun,” Lucy chimes in.

″Don’t miss us too much because we’re good with Daddy,” Ben assures me.

″But miss us enough to come home,” Sophie adds.

And then they’re gone, their little voices disappearing into the distance. I picture them running off to join the throng around whatever parent had brought snacks that week.

It was Lisa so it’d be a good snack for them.

″Casey?”

″Take me off speakerphone,” I beg.

″How’s it going? Are you having fun?”

″No, I’m not having fun!” I burst. “You made me come here, and Ben scored his first goal and I missed it. Did you get a picture? A video of it.”

″Nita got a video of the whole game. I’ll get it from her. It was a great shot, Case; you’d be proud of him.”

″Of course I’m proud of him! I want to be there to see it, not here in a hotel room with a really comfortable bed.”

″Are you crying?”

″No!” But the sob escapes in a laugh/cough sound.

″There’ll be other goals,” J.B. assures me, sounding so tender that I have to choke back another sob.

″He’s been playing for two years and this is the first! What if it’s the only one? And I missed it because I took a selfish trip away from them. I want to come home.”

″Casey…”

″I mean it. I’m going to get the first flight home. With the time difference, I think I can make it before they go to bed.”

″Stop it, Casey. You’re there to have fun. There’ll be other games. The kids are fine. You need this.”

″I need to be with them.”

″You need some time with your friends. If you try to book another flight, I’m canceling your credit card.”

″You’re what?”

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