Page 69 of Poppy Kisses
His little shoulders fell. “Oh.”
Goddamn, how much would getting let down by some important adults in his life affect him?
The door to Poppy’s bedroom opened and she burst out, her hair as wild as her eyes. “Sorry! I just need to brush my teeth and then it’s lake time.”
The disappointment was wiped out of his expression. “Can we bring the pail and shovel?”
“Absolutely,” she said before shutting the door behind her.
I glanced at the time and relief puffed inside of me. She was cutting it close, but she was up and we would be leaving.
Poppy wasn’t in the bathroom long, and she flew into the kitchen. “So I didn’t pack snacks last night because I didn’t want to wake you up, and I wanted to ask— Are we going to eat lunch first or wait and have an early dinner?” She looked between me and Auggie.
“Lake first,” Auggie said, grinning.
“You got it, my dude.” She ping-ponged through the kitchen, loading a lunch bag with pouches of snacks, fruits, and veggies. Then she filled water bottles and stole from my stash of juice boxes. I had to hide them, or Auggie would drown himself in juice. Auggie and I finished folding.
“Whew,” she said. “We have time to put laundry away and then it’s eleven. Right on the dot.”
“Yeah!” Auggie grabbed an armload of towels and sprinted upstairs.
“I’m so sorry,” Poppy whispered loudly. “I had an alarm set, but it was for evening, not morning.”
“I thought you were sleeping one off.” I should’ve given her the benefit of the doubt, but old habits died hard.
She frowned. “I didn’t have more than one drink. My sisters are not a wild crowd.”
I held my hands up. “Sorry. It’s just…history.” I gathered towels for my downstairs bathroom. The weight of her gaze was on me. When I came out of the bathroom, she was in the same spot in the kitchen, her lips in a troubled line.
“Did she sleep one off a lot when Auggie was waiting on her?” she asked.
“Does a horse have four legs?” The tension from earlier threatened to form again. I made sure Auggie hadn’t returned before I continued. “We divorced when he was five. But I left six months before that. He needed constant vigilance, and that infringed on her time. Then the first few years after our divorce, she’d try taking him for a weekend, but by then he was walking. And running. And…yeah. He was stood up a lot by his mother.”
Her lips parted and sympathy filled her face. I’d allow it. For Auggie. But I wouldn’t tell her how many times I’d waited, the pathetic husband hoping for some scraps of attention from his wife.
Small footsteps pounded down the stairs.
“I’m ready!” Auggie was in shorts and his feet were bare.
Poppy’s fraught expression vanished. She aimed a bright smile toward him. “I am, too, but your dad’s not in shorts.” She blinked innocently at me. “Do you have sandals for wading?”
It wasn’t even June. “The water’s going to be frigid.”
She laughed. “We’re not skinny-dipping.”
“What’s that?” Auggie asked, curiosity filling his voice.
I cocked a brow and bit back a shit-eating grin. “Yeah, Poppy. What is it?”
“I—uh…” She gulped. “I’m not the parent, so I shouldn’t?—”
“No, really.” I stifled a laugh and pretended to think. “Skinny-dipping? Not sure I know what that is.”
She narrowed her eyes at me before sliding her gaze to Auggie. “It’s when you go swimming with no clothes on.”
“Naked?” Auggie asked, scandalized but also interested.
Poppy nodded. “Nothing on.”
