Page 2 of Promise Me Sunshine

“Oh, wow!” I lean in and sure enough, there’s another guy in all the pics, at the mic in some and jamming on a steel guitar in others.

“Carp Hollis,” she says, supplying the name I clearly couldn’t come up with. “Ever heard of him?”

“Your dad is Carp Hollis?” I don’t know much about bluegrass or country, but even I know that he’s kinda royalty.

“Yup. That’s Dad.” She looks affectionately at the pictures before her expression clouds. I instantly recognize that look, and my stomach drops to my toes. “He passed about a year and a half ago. This is his apartment. Ainsley and I are still getting used to it, to be honest…Why don’t you come meet Ains.”

She starts to usher me out of the hallway.

“Reese!” calls the man who is still standing in the open door.

She doesn’t turn around. “Then stay if you want, Miles!”

I’m looking back and forth between them. “Um. I’m Lenny,” I offer to him with a little wave of my hand. “Lenny Bellamy.”

He’s ignoring me, staring daggers into the back of Reese’s head.

“That’s Miles. Ainsley’s uncle,” Reese finally says into the silence. “He lives upstairs. He’ll probably be around today, if that’s okay with you.”

“Oh, uh. Sure?” I don’t usually enjoy babysitting with an audience, but heismy future husband after all, as prickly as he may be.

The apartment is gargantuan and curated and polished. Kitchen, living room, dining room, a handful of bedrooms and bathrooms, and then, finally, in what she refers to as the “drawing room,” is a little somebody who is, in fact, drawing.

“Ains,” Reese calls.

The little somebody doesn’t stand, she just drops her colored pencil and pivots on her knees to face us. She’s about seven years old, with dandelion levels of staticky hair. Tiny purple glasses magnify her eyeballs to twice their size and she’s swimming in a very faded Madonna concert tee. “Is that a cat eating lasagna on your shirt?” she asks me.

“It’s Garfield,” I clarify.

“Who’s that?”

“Oh, it’s a good thing we’re going to hang out all weekend because we’ve got a lot of ground to cover.”

She nervously tugs the hem of her T-shirt. “Okay.”

“I’m Lenny,” I say, and I leave the adults behind to sit next to her. “What’s your name?”

She frowns at me. “Mom didn’t tell you?”

I smile. “She did, but people usually start getting to know each other by exchanging names.”

“Oh. Yeah. I’m Ainsley.” She makes a puke face.

“You don’t like your name?”

“There are three other Ainsleys at my school. Different grades but…” She shrugs.

“Oh, really? Wow. Ainsley sounds like a unique name to me. If you could choose any other name, what would it be?”

She shrugs again, still nervous to meet me. “I don’t know. Something cooler. Like…Blackbeard. Or Darth Vader.”

I burst out laughing, and she tries to hide her pleased smile while she plays with the hem of her T-shirt.

I instantly like her, and I like her mom more by extension. This uptown address, Reese’s perfect ponytail, head to toe in Lululemon, I would have put some serious money on Ainsley having been carefully manicured into a mini-Reese. I’ve seen it before. But Reese and Ainsley are a delightfully odd couple.

Reese is leaning in the doorway and smiling at us. “Listen, I’m going to get a little work done in my home office for a bit before I head out. Come get me if you need anything, Ains.”

“ ’Kay.”

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