Page 39 of Unravel Me

Connor blinks at her. Looks at me. Back to Rosie, then me. He points at the slide. “Dada, s-ide?”

Rosie buries her face in her hand. “I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be.” I start climbing onto the platform. “You want some help getting to the top, buddy?”

His fingers grasp mine, and I look down at the connection. His hand is so tiny, all his fingers wrapped around my pinky, and when he tugs me along behind him, I’m struck by the warm, tight feeling in my chest.

At the top of the slide, Connor pauses. “Dada, baby, s-ide.”

Rosie snickers. “Oh, baby. I’m not sure Adam can fit down the slide.”

My brows skyrocket. “He wants me to…?”

“Mhmm.”

“But I…” That little blue slide is narrow as fuck. I’m a fairly confident guy and I don’t turn down most challenges, but this…I don’t know about this. A lifetime of skating has given me what I’ve gracefully dubbed as a hockey butt. Hockey butts…they don’t fit down kids’ slides. “I’m sorry, buddy.” I glance over my shoulder, down at my own ass. “I don’t think…well, the thing is…”

“Adam’s got a bubble butt,” Rosie tells him seriously, as if he can understand the meaning behind her words. Her playful gaze rises to mine. “It’s perfect, by the way, and I’ve caught myself staring at it way too often, but don’t let it go to your head.”

The corner of my mouth lifts, exploding into a slow grin. “Too late. I can feel my head getting bigger by the second.” I lift my arms overhead with an exaggerated groan. “All right, buddy. Let’s do this. Let’s see if my perfect bubble butt gets us down this slide.” I scoot around him, wedge my hips between the plastic, and Connor squeals, launching himself into my lap. Pressing his back to my chest, I wrap my arms around him. “Ready?”

I push away from the slide, starting our descent.

It’s…

Entirely underwhelming. What the fuck.

I wiggle my hips as rigorously as I can, trying to gain momentum. Connor doesn’t seem to mind, giggling and screeching away, and best of all? I’ve never heard Rosie laugh like that before.

It’s beautiful and airy, so carefree and wild, letting me see how heavy it had been, the weight of wondering how I’d react to her having a son. I’d give anything to capture this moment in a photo, because right now, I see all of her, but more than that,I’ve found her.

I wonder if she’ll find me too.

We make it to the end of the eight-foot slide after twenty-five grueling seconds, and the second my butt hits the wood chips, Connor’s pulling me right back up. We ride it again and again, until he switches to the swing, and eventually Rosie has to pry him away for lunch.

Beneath the shade of a tree, Rosie unpacks sandwiches, fruits, and muffins from her bag. “It’s simple today.” She holds out a container of sandwiches. “PB banana.”

“Oh, no. I can’t. It’s for you two.”

“There’s enough for us all,” she assures me, placing a small plate of food in front of Connor.

“Ba-na,” he says excitedly, stuffing a bite of PB and banana sandwich in his mouth. “Ba-na!”

Rosie giggles and hands me a sandwich triangle. “I never know with Connor, so I always have extra. Some days he takes two bites and says done, and some days he—”

—toddles over to my lap, plops himself in it, and takes a bite of my sandwich, apparently. All while growling like a bear and still holding onto his own sandwich, which is, to be honest, highly fucking impressive.

“—doesn’t stop eating,” Rosie finishes with a sigh. “There’s no such thing asminein our home. What’s mine is his, and what’s his is…well, it’s his too. I get the scraps.”

As if on cue, Connor offers his mom the crust of his sandwich. “Mama.”

Chuckling, I tickle his side. “You’re trouble, just like Mama, aren’t you?” He snickers, squirming in my lap before munching another bite of my sandwich. “Little trouble, that’s you, huh, buddy? That’s okay. I’ll share my sandwich with you any day.”

Connor takes one last bite before holding the crust up to my mouth, and I eat it without thinking.

“Probably not the kind of germs you were thinking of swapping, huh?” Rosie murmurs before her eyes widen. “Not that you were thinking of swapping any germs at all. Not, like, my germs and your germs. I didn’t mean that. I didn’t mean, like, you were thinking of kissing me or anything ridiculous like that.”

“Uh-huh,” I muse, watching as she snatches up the garbage and leaps to her feet, hauling ass to the trash can.

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