“You have got to be kidding me!” Darcie’s steps pound on the pavement, her bullhorn clutched tightly in her hands.

The tow truck lowers the car in the roped off area while Reed’s positions the various sledgehammers, hammers, gloves, baseball bats and other tools we picked up to do some serious damage to this car.

I might even have to buy a handful of tickets myself. Pete hops on a plane tomorrow and let’s just say my patience has worn thin. There’s a reason we’re divorced.

“Oh, hey, Darcie. Georgia,” I say, acknowledging Mean Mom number one and her constant shadow.

“This is your idea of fun?” Darcie asks in a screechy voice.

“Yep.”

“The kids can’t do it, they could get hurt. Do you want that on your conscious? Maybe your boyfriends can afford the lawsuits, but I know you can’t.”

She thinks she’s going to bully me to breaking down. Not happening. I laugh a little that she still believes Pete, Reed, and I are in some kind of relationship. What an idiot.

“It’s a parents-only event.”

“You’ll get no one. I’ll make sure of it.” She stomps away, but she can’t do anything about it because Principal Weddle already okay’d it.

Reed walks over to me. “How angry is she?” he asked with a chuckle.

“Pretty pissed off.”

“Good.”

I step into him, wrapping my arms around his neck and lifting up on my tiptoes to kiss him. We have a little time before the carnival starts. Pete is bringing Jade after she slept over at his parents’ last night.

“Let’s go grab some coffee?”

He checks out his watch behind my back. “We have an hour.”

“Perfect.”

We choose to walk the two blocks to the nearest Starbucks since the weather is nice today. His hand swings in mine on the way back and I think of how I could really get used to this.

“Since we have some time before everything starts, we need to discuss something. I was going to wait until tonight, but I can’t,” he says.

The pit that’s been in my belly since the topic of him relocating elsewhere came up, morphs into a crevice.

“You got an offer?” I ask, hoping I’m wrong. It’s not that I don’t want him to succeed in his career, but we need more time to see what this is before we make big decisions about our future together.

He nods toward the park a block away from the school and leads me over to a bench where we sit.

“Tell me, Reed.”

He sets our coffees down behind him on the bench, both of his hands taking mine in his. “I got an offer.”

My eyes burn, and my nose crinkles and that crevice turns into a gorge. “Of course you did.”

“It’s in New York,” he says.

“City?” I clarify although I already know. Of course, he could be the DA in New York City. How could I ever compete with that?

“Take it,” I tell him. I have to force the words out of my mouth. I know what it’s like to put your dreams on hold for a relationship and I can’t ask him to do that for me.

“Will you come?” he asks, with hope in his eyes.

“So, you’re going for sure? You’ve already made the decision?” My heart shatters, cracks and then splits into two.

“I don’t know. It’s a huge opportunity that will probably never come again. But this”—he motions between us—“I know is the real thing.”

I stand, and his hands drop to his lap. “You don’t know that. We’ve haven’t been together that long.”

He stands, too, and wraps his arms around me, his stubble pricking my cheeks. I lean in to his security. “Time isn’t an indicator of love.”

I rest my hands on his chest. It feels so safe in his arms, but the urge not to repeat past mistakes shouts its mantra in my head.

Protect yourself. Look out for yourself. You can do it on your own.

“Reed, I just got here and besides, I have my mom, Jade, and my schooling to consider. I gave up everything I was working toward for a man before and look where I ended up.”

He steps back, and my hands fall between us.

“I’m not Pete.” His eyes fill with an anger I’ve never seen from him before.

“I know, but you’ve got to see where I’m coming from.”

He steps forward again, taking my hands in his. “I know you’re scared. I know you’ve been hurt, but I’m not him. I’ll take care of you and Jade and your mom can come with us.”

I shake my head. “She won’t want to leave everybody and everything here. She’s spent a lifetime here. Otherwise, she would have just moved to L.A. in the first place.”

“Okay. Let’s just leave it on the table. They don’t need an answer until Wednesday. Just think about it.” Hope shines brightly in his eyes now and I have to glance away.

I don’t want to tell him, but no matter what, nothing will change. It’s either a long-distance relationship—which the thought of makes me want to throw up because I’ll never see him—or nothing. And a long-distance relationship would be even more difficult given the fact that my daughter is already having one of those with her father.

He wraps me in his arms and I close my eyes wondering how much longer I’ll have him here with me.

“Let’s get this carnival over with and we can discuss it more tonight when you’re at my house.”

I nod. I know it wasn’t Reed’s intention to put a dark cloud over today, but his news as wonderful as it is for him, makes me want to put on my pajamas, play sappy eighties love songs and cry over a tub of ice cream.

Because sooner or later, he’ll have to make a decision. And if he makes the right one, it means leaving me behind.

---

“You have every divorcee buying the tickets, so they can imagine it’s their ex’s car?” Pete comes up with Jade on his shoulders.

“Maybe you have aggression you’d like to get out,” I say, taking the tickets from a mom and handing her some protective eyewear. I set the clock for five minutes once she picks up her object of choice.

“Not on a car.” He glances at Reed, who’s talking to Helen.

“Give it a rest.”

“I heard a little rumor.” Pete lowers Jade off his shoulders and she runs over to Henry.

I follow her progress and Reed signals if it’s okay for Helen to take Jade and Henry inside the school. I nod.

“Don’t.” I hold my hand up, but Pete doesn’t listen, as per usual.

“Your boy is going to New York, huh?”

I shake my head, ignoring him, eyeing the clock and watching the woman go to town on the hood of the car with a hammer.

“You going to follow? Because you’ll need my permission to take Jade even farther away from me.” He crosses his arms with a smug look on his face.

“It’s none of your business.”

“That’s where you’re wrong, Vic, Jade is my business. Where you go, Jade goes.”

He’s right. We both know it. I would need his permission to move Jade to New York. Tears well up in my eyes as the emotions I’ve been suppressing all afternoon rise to the surface, hitting me like a hurricane-force wind.

“Oh my God, just let it go right now! I will tell you if anything changes.”

“Hey.” Reed comes to my side, quickly appraising the situation—me about to break down in tears and Pete’s smug face. “Can’t you just give it a fucking rest?” he says to Pete. “You had your chance. You treated her like shit. She divorced you two years ago.”

They both take a step closer to one another.

“You’re going to have her uproot her entire life, so you can say you won?” Pete grinds out.

“What are you even talking about?” Reed asks, looking at him like he’s an idiot.

They’re chest to chest and I wiggle my hands in, trying to push on both of their chests to separate them. A crowd is forming around the perimeter of our little group.

“You’re pissed because you always wanted to compete with me. I got the girl, I got the family, and I make a shit-ton more money than you.” Pete laughs like Reed’s a joke.

“What are you talking about?” I ask Pete as I push on his chest.

“You think I’m playing a game?” Reed asks, cold fury in his voice.

“I think you threw yourself at her because you want to be able to hold it over me. Guess what? It worked. I want her back.”

The buzzer goes off and the woman comes over with a huge smile on her face and sweat beading down her forehead, handing me back the eyewear protection.

“Next,” I call out to keep things going, but Pete’s words ring in my ear. He wants me back?

No one comes up to take a turn because they’re all enthralled in Reed and Pete’s argument.

“I told you, three is a crowd,” one woman says to another and they laugh.

I roll my eyes.

“We were always in competition. Who got a better grade? That night, I stole Vic out from under your nose and you’ve never forgotten it.” Pete crosses his arms, a smug look on his face like he’s won the argument.

“I saw her first,” Reed fires back. “You may have spent the better part of a decade with her, but she was always mine. And you know it.”

The buzzer drops from my hands and they both look over at me.

“What?” I ask quietly.

Reed steps toward me, reaching out but I back step until I hit the metal barrier.

“No.” I shake my head, putting the eyewear in my hand on my face. “I’m some sort of prize in a sick game between you two?”

“No. That’s not it.” Reed fights for me to listen to him, but Pete stays in place, happy with what he’s accomplished.

I hit the timer, grab the baseball bat and a can of spray paint and push past the barrier toward the car.

Jumping on the roof, I swing the baseball bat down on the windshield, hitting it over and over again until it shatters. For the next five minutes, I stomp, hit, pound and generally go ballistic on the scrap of metal. My shitty marriage to Pete wham, Reed only being with me to get back at Pete wham, my feelings for Reed wham, the fact he’s leaving me wham...all the tension and emotion that’s been whirling around inside of me unleashes.

The buzzer goes off and I wipe the sweat from my brow before I pull out the can of spray paint. In big pink letters on the hood, I spell out what must come first. ME.

I drop the bat on the pavement and walk past Reed without a word. Everyone else is standing around like I’m Negan from The Walking Dead.

Haven’t they ever seen a woman let off a little steam before?