Page 96 of How to Say I Do
Liam shrugged. He still had his swampy, syrupy plate in front of him because he refused to get up and take it to the sink. If his stubbornness got turned up any stronger, I’d be burying him with that plate. “He might be a keeper.”
Noël pranced down the stairs, looking confused and calling for Jason. “Jason, I found this in my suitcase—”
Thiswas aBluey-themed gift-wrapped present, which Noël set down on the island in front of Jason.
Jason gasped so high and bright that dogs three counties away were probably cocking their heads and searching for the sound.
Noël propped his hands on his hips and seemed perturbed and befuddled, like surprise and smuggled gifts from cartoon characters were daily annoyances he had to put up with. “I think it’s for you?”
There was a big blue paw print on the center of the gift, and inside the paw print, beautifully done calligraphy read “To Jason McKinley.”
I smelled Midtown, Manhattan, FAO Schwarz.
Jason’s squeal broke the sound barrier. “Mom! Dad!Blueyknows myname!” He bounced up and down on his stool, and, looking at him, I saw the same electric excitement and unrestrained joy that I must have thrown off whenever Dad surprised me with little gifts from my wishes on our shooting stars.
“Well, go on,” Liam said. “What did Bluey get you?”
Wrapping paper got torn off and thrown on the floor. Jason two-handed the box he revealed, lips parted and eyes huge as he sounded out the letters on the front.
“It’s atelescope!” he shouted. It was a kids’ do-it-yourself telescope kit, an artsy kind of science-fair-in-a-box thing. The front had a couple kids looking through their homemade telescopes, peeking up at bright night skies and gigantic, colorful planets.
“Oo, you make it yourself?” Savannah, the science teacher, looked ready to tear open the box and start building. Liam, on the other hand, shot me and Noël a peeved look before he chuckled into his coffee.
“Say, ‘Thank you, Bluey,’” Savannah said, with a meaningful look at Noël behind Jason’s back.
“Thank you, Bluey!” Jason bellowed, loud enough that he could make sure Bluey heard him wherever he was, off in New York City or Hollywood or wherever beloved cartoons spent their down time. Liam blinked and shook his head like a wet dog. Noël cupped his fingers over his cheeks and worked his jaw like he was trying to pop his ears. The last of my hangover shattered inside of me.
“Can we open it right now?” Jason begged. “Please, please, please? Can we build it today? Can we, please?”
“Anyone want more coffee?” Savannah asked.
We moved to the porch for the great telescope build. Savannah, Jason, and I were the builders, while Noël and Liam hunkered down on the porch steps well out of the way with a bottle of wine between them. I kept an eye out, wary about the two of them on their own, but then I got pulled into the telescope making, guiding Jason on how to place the lenses and what refraction and reflection meant, and how everything he’d look at through the telescope would be upside down. “You’re going to see the moon like the people in Australia do,” I told him.
“Wow,” he breathed. “Bluey has thecoolestthings.”
When I did tune my ears back to Liam and Noël, it sounded like they were doing just fine, and were passing stories back and forth. “It wasoutrageous,” Noël said. He had his hands hooked beneath his knees and Liam hanging on every word. “Theentireballet company—”
Another time, glancing over, and Liam was in the middle of an elaborate tale, gesturing across the porch and holding out his hands. “’Sum bitch was the biggest thing I ever saw. Thirteen feet and over a thousand pounds. Felt like I was looking at a dinosaur.” Noël shivered head to toe.
When the telescope was finished, Jason whined about how many more hours of daylight there were and how long he had to wait before he could use it. Liam tried to distract him with an expedition to the yard to dig up bugs and beetles and search for geodes. “Daddy things,” Liam said. Jason kicked dirt as he followed Liam, his downcast chin glued to his chest.
Noël and I escaped to the barn. Peanut was overjoyed to see Noël again, and they spent ten minutes fawning over each other and ignoring me. After, Peanut trotted off without so much as ahow do you do, and she tossed her head and snorted when I called her name.
“Serves me right that the ones I love most give me all the sass,” I grumbled to Noël. He laughed.
We perched on the split-rail fence and watched Peanut and Pickle munch on hay. Noël tipped his head to the sky. Sunshine filled up his face. I stripped long blades of grass and tried to stop my heart from galloping away.
“Is Liam behaving himself?” I was still wondering about that talk Liam said he’d given to Noël. “You guys all right?”
“Yeah, Liam is really something.” Noël chuckled to himself, as if he and Liam shared some kind of private joke now. “We’re good. He loves you very much.”
I plucked another tall blade of grass and started tearing it into itty bitty shreds. “You know, you’re good with kids.” Noël eyeballed me like I’d just said he should rock the nineties’ glam look. I grinned. “Well, you’re good with Jason.”
“He’s easy to like. He’s a miniature version of you.”
“Have you ever thought ’bout having kids someday?”
Noël stared at the fields as his fingers plucked splinters from the fence. He was quiet for a long time. “I have literally never thought about it,” he finally said. “That was always an ‘ugh, not now’ kind of thing.”
