Page 76 of Fall to Me
Placing my hand to her face, I caress her cheek, my eyes tangling with hers.
“He thought I did this to you,” I tell her.
She shakes her head in disgust and dabs the wound with an alcohol swab causing me to hiss.
“Ow. Fuck, that burns.”
She cuts a glare her dad’s way.
“What? It’s only a little nick. Don’t look at me like that. You’ll understand why I’m so protective when you two have kids,” Rhett says.
“Yeah, well, we won't be having any of those for a long, long time,” she counters.
Something about her comment sits heavy on my chest. Just like it did when she took that morning-after pill on Saturday afternoon. Stupid, I know, especially with everything going on right now, but that doesn’t keep me from asking, “How long are we talking?”
River laughs it off, but I’m not playing.
“I’m thinking maybe a year. You know? Give us some time together, just the two of us,” I say and toss Marcy a wink. “What doyouthink, Grandma?”
River’s mom looks at her daughter and laughs, pointing her finger at me.
“Oh, I like him,” she says.
“Anyways.” River rolls her eyes and places a butterfly stitch on my ear, then covers it with gauze. “It’s late, and I feel like I could sleep for a week straight.”
She closes up the first aid box, throws the trash away, then grabs my hand.
“Night, Mom . . . Dad? You going home soon, or are you gonna stay here all night and traumatize me some more?”
He scratches the back of his neck. That’s not suspicious as hell.
“Think I’ll just crash here. Carter and I are getting up in a few hours to go hunting anyways. Isn’t that right, son?”
“Yep.”
That fucking rat bastard. Using me as his scapegoat.
River leads me down the hallway and into a room, flipping on the light. A queen size bed with a fluffy white duvet and a bunchof frilly pillows sits on the left. She crosses the room and begins tossing the pillows onto a chair in the corner. I look around and walk towards a corkboard with pictures of her, Aspen, and Tucker pinned to it. She saunters over and smiles, pointing at a picture of her and Aspen playing in a sprinkler in front of a different farmhouse.
“Aspen used to live about a half a mile down the road. We were six years old here. We spent most of our summers together.”
She points to another picture, this one of her and Aspen in their teens, sitting on the tailgate of a pickup truck.
“I remember this one like it was yesterday. We were all at a bonfire, drinking and living what we thought was our best lives. Much too young to drink but you know, teenage shit and all that. Anyways, that’s the night she started dating Jason. And as much as I hate the douchebag, he brought us Tucker, so I guess he did something right.”
I stare at her as she smiles, her eyes roaming over the pictures.
“When Tucker came along, it wasn’t only Aspen’s life that changed. He became my world. I know I’m like the fun aunt, but sometimes I feel like a bonus mom, you know? Like he’s also mine. I held her hand as he came into the world with his great big personality. The doctor even allowed me to cut the cord.”
She beams as she turns toward me. “I do want to be a mom one day. I want to fill my home with so many kids I won’t even know what to do with myself. I want messy hands and growth chart marks on door frames. Game nights. Dinner at the table every night. A home filled with laughter. I’m thinking of like, six, or maybe even eight kids. Needs to be an even number. You can keep me pregnant until I’m forty if you want to.”
“Seriously?”
“No. I’m fucking with you,Elmer,” she laughs. “But you set that up so perfectly.”
Tossing her ass on the bed, I tickle her. She kicks her feet, laughing uncontrollably as I dig my fingers into her ribs.
“Stop. Stop. Stop,” she wheezes. “You’re gonna make me pee my pants.”
