Page 106 of Nothing But It All
I just have to figure out how to make that happen without ruining everything else I’m trying to do. I certainly can’t just spring another responsibility on Lauren.Fuck.
“Look,” he says, taking pity on me. “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking. Apparently, when you get news that you might be dying, it makes you start reevaluating a lot of shit.”
I hold my head in my hands.
“Promise me that you won’t make the same mistakes that I did. Tell me that you’ll remember to live your life while you’re living it,” he says, his tone rough and raw.
“Yeah,” I say, dropping my hands. “I will.”
“I mean it, Jack. I fucked my life up and your mom’s. Don’t let me screw up yours and the kids’ too.”
The man sitting in front of me isn’t the same man I grew up with. He’s wise, in a strange way, and considerate. I knew my father loved my children, but I didn’t know he had that much true affection for anyone else.
Maybe we’re all changing.
“Got any questions?” he asks, teasing me. “Need me to give you a hug?”
“Don’t be a dick.”
He chuckles. “Now, let’s keep this between me and you. All right? Lauren has enough on her plate, and those kids of yours will drive me straight to my coffin if they hear a word about this.”
“Too soon for coffin jokes,” I say, shaking my head.
“Promise me you won’t tell them, then.”
My brain is a mess of inputs, overwhelmed by the data it’s had to process already this morning.
Promise I won’t tell my family that my father might have cancer?
How did this happen? What happened last night to make everything screwed up this morning?
“Yeah,” I say, the word hollow. “I won’t say anything.”
“Good. Now, back to Maddie. Are we going to egg this kid’s house or what?”
A smile slowly trickles across my face. It pulls the corners of his lips up too.
What a day.
What a fucking day.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
LAUREN
Emotional exhaustion is entirely worse than physical exhaustion.
Wishing for a pain reliever to ease the ache in my head, but too tired to get up and get one, I stretch out on the sofa with a sigh.
Where did the day go? Didn’t I just wake up? Wasn’t I in Jack’s arms, basking in the afterglow of a night of perfection ten minutes ago?
Nope. Somehow, we went from coffee with the morning dew to dinner after a storm—both theoretically and literally.
Maddie’s devastation has swallowed my whole day. There was no way I could leave her to her own devices when she was listening to music one minute and sobbing the next.
Trust me, kid. I understand heartbreak.
I lay a hand on my chest and focus on the steady beating of my heart.
