Page 17 of Captivating Mr. Second Chance

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“Come on, buddy. Why don’t you come with me?” Ethan offered his hand to his nephew, so he’d leave his mom alone, and Leah sent him a grateful smile.

“I’m hungry,” Trace said, tugging on Ethan’s fingers. “Like a lion.” Then he roared, and Ethan bent down, roaring right back.

“Dinner will be ready soon, but you gotta be a little patient. Look.” Ethan pointed to a couple of coloring books haphazardly thrown on the kitchen table. “Let’s color for a bit.” He sat Trace on the chair next to him and spread out the animal-themed coloring books and crayons between them while Justin and Leah finished dinner.

It’d been a few weeks since the diagnosis, and Justin had begun a regimen of medications to help the symptoms, but he still had a long road ahead of him. Watching him wrap an arm around Leah’s waist, peering over her shoulder as she fiddled with a pan on the stove, Ethan felt that familiar brick land in his stomach again. His brother and sister-in-law had already been through so much, with Leah’s parents passing within months of each other, and now this. They didn’t deserve it.

But god, they’d made a cute little kid. Rubbing his hand over Trace’s short curls, Ethan kissed the side of his head. He’d do whatever he could to help his family, although at the moment, he didn’t know what else to do besides make sure his nephew was well taken care of, taking some of the load off Justin and Leah.

“How’s school?” Ethan asked, and Trace exchanged a green crayon for a yellow, scribbling in the trees behind a leopard.

“Good. I was line leader today.”

“Yeah? You like that job?”

“Uh-huh.” Trace swiped at his nose with his sleeve. “And doing the weather.” Then he started mumbling some song about what’s the weather today, and Ethan laughed, happy that Trace was still too young to understand the full weight of his father’s situation and, unfortunately, his own possible future.

Ethan tried not to dwell on the bad stuff, but sometimes it seeped into his thinking, and all of this had made him curious about his own health, family, and identity. Even though his parents had never kept information from him, Ethan never felt the need to contact his biological parents. After seeing the anguish his brother had gone through when he couldn’t find his own, Ethan hadn’t been interested in following the same path. Yet now, he’d been reconsidering that stance.

Trace held his paper up to Ethan. “For you! You hafta hang it on your fridge.”

“You got it, my man.” Ethan took it and blew out a low whistle. “A masterpiece like this might need to be framed. Put on the mantel.”

“Mantel?” Trace hopped from his seat onto Ethan’s lap. “What’s a mantel?”

“It’s usually a big piece of wood that goes over a fireplace, and you put important stuff on it, like pictures of people you love.”

“Like that?” Trace pointed to the half wall separating the kitchen from the dining room, where a picture of Leah’s mom and dad sat, and Ethan nodded.

“Kind of like that.”

“Papa and Granny are in heaven,” Trace told him as if he didn’t remind everyone at least once a week. The kid was obsessed with death and heaven and the stars in the sky being those people who had passed. Incidentally, Trace was also obsessed withThe Lion King.

“I know, buddy.”

“Hey, by the way,” Leah said, turning around. “My cousin’s birthday is coming up, and we wanted to go up to the city for the night. Have a little date night away from the gorilla over there.”

Trace puffed out a couple of gorilla sounds, banging at his chest.

“We asked Mom and Dad to watch him, but they already had plans,” Justin added, his head ticking to the side, another of those uncontrollable movements.

Ethan held his hand up. “I’ll watch him. No problem. When is it?”

“End of the month,” Leah said, setting a fork down and clicking the burner off. “We’d be staying over. Is that okay?”

“Yeah, of course.” Then he held his hand out to Trace for a high five. “You’re coming to stay with Uncle Ethan for a night.”

“Really?” He shot his arms up, cheering. “Woo-hoo!”

Justin grabbed a few dishes from a cabinet and walked around to set the table. “All right, kiddo. Have a seat. It’s time for dinner.”

Trace reached out for his special plastic plate so his food didn’t touch and smacked the table with his fork a few times.

“Uh-uh, no, sir,” Leah said, eyeing him so that the four-year-old immediately froze, though he still shot her his best grin. “You think you’re so cute.”

“Like his dad,” Justin said, having a seat, and Leah clucked her tongue at them both before setting the chicken, green beans, and potatoes on the table.

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