It is a glorious day in the daycare world. Our worn-out Frozen DVD has now been overtaken by a much better movie. After years of the kids begging to watch Frozen, and years of wanting to superglue earplugs into my ears to avoid hearing those dumb songs, the movie has been dethroned. Moana is now all the rage, and I totally love it.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure I’ll grow to hate the movie eventually. There’s only so many times you can watch the same thing at work each day. But for some reason the kids love the repetition.

While the dozen toddlers are all laying on the big circle rug and watching the movie, I prepare twelve cups of juice and twelve plates with crackers, cheese, and grapes on them for snack time. I love being at work because it helps me take my mind off things.

Lately, things at home are a little hard to get used to. Grandpa is getting depressed from not being able to see, and it breaks my heart. He hates having to ask us for help, but he can’t do most things by himself anymore. Mom is extra stressed about it, too. I’ve been doing what I can around the house to make both of their lives easier. And even though coming to work is usually stressful because kids are crazy and need lots of attention, lately it’s been my reprieve from everything else in my life.

I gather the kids up and have them sit at the tables for their snack. In my back pocket, my phone vibrates, but I don’t check it. Cell phones aren’t exactly forbidden at work, but I think it’s wrong to send flirty texts when I’m watching people’s children.

And I know it’s probably TJ texting me, because it’s always TJ texting me. He’s been all over me this week, walking me to class, texting me, and even sitting with me and Erin at lunch two times.

I don’t know how I feel about it. I’m trying really hard to like him, and I do like him a little. But it’s not like this instant love connection. He really seems to like me though, so I’m trying to get to know him better, trying to like him. I keep wondering if things would be different if I had never experienced the heartbreak from Shawn and Gavin. Would I like TJ more if my heart wasn’t already hurt?

Mrs. Bradley comes into the toddler room a second later, and I’m glad I didn’t take out my phone to check the text. Now I still look like a model employee. She smiles warmly at me.

“You wanna take off early?”

“Huh? Why would I do that?” My shift only started thirty minutes ago.

“Well, I thought you might want to help.”

“Help what?”

Now she looks just as confused as I do. “Help outside? Your greenhouse?”

I run to the window and peer outside. Gavin’s truck is parked in front of the greenhouse. He’s moving materials around and setting them into piles.

“Wow,” I say, my breath fogging the cold window. It’s only October but it’s been colder than usual lately. “I can’t believe he’s here.”

Mrs. Bradley doesn’t now the whole story, just that the guy who promised to help rebuild the greenhouse hasn’t done it yet. I turn to her. “Would you mind?”

“Of course not,” she says. “Stay on the clock since you’ll still be working on the greenhouse.”

I smile. “Thank you.”

I don’t know why I do it, but I head into the kitchen and make two mugs of hot chocolate. Then I make my way outside. It’s nearly six o’clock and the sun will be setting in about thirty minutes. In the time it took me to get over here, Gavin has turned on his truck’s headlights to use them as light.

My heart pounds as I get closer. He still hasn’t seen me. The smell of the hot chocolate makes my mouth water and I find myself hoping he’ll like it, even though I hate him and I shouldn’t care. It’s a special recipe that Mrs. Bradley uses and we make a big pot of it every day when it’s cold. The kids love it.

Finally, Gavin looks up. His cheeks are pink from the cold, and he’s only wearing jeans and a grey sweater when he really should have a jacket.

“Hi,” he says, almost as if he’s afraid to talk.

“Hello.” I hold out one of the paper coffee cups. Steam rises from the plastic lid. “Hot chocolate,” I say.

He takes one in his gloved hands. “Thank you.”

I gaze over the piles of building supplies as he takes a sip. “Wow, this is good.”

“I know,” I say, drinking from mine. “Secret recipe.”

“Clarissa I’m sorry it’s taken me so long.”

I look up at him, seeing nothing but desperation and worry in his eyes. He scratches the back of his neck. “Did you read my letter?”

I chew on my bottom lip, then shake my head. His letter is still sealed in the envelope. It’s shoved in the drawer of my nightstand. I don’t know why, but I can’t bring myself to read it right now. I guess I’m afraid it’ll make me stop hating him so much, and if I do that, then I’ll get hurt again. I can’t let myself fall for Gavin Voss another time. I just can’t.

“Okay,” he says. “Well, I need to get to work.”

“What can I help with?” I ask.

“It’s cold. Don’t worry about it.”

“I’m wearing warmer clothing than you are,” I say, chugging another sip of my hot chocolate. I set it down on the bumper of his truck. “Let’s work.”

Gavin has already cut the wooden frame pieces to size. We lay them out and hammer them into individual walls, just like Grandpa and I had done this summer. As we work, we don’t talk unless necessary. Like, “hand me that tape measure,” or “can you get another box of nails?”

I find myself slipping into the work. Focusing on the hammer hitting the nail, the pieces lining up at the corners. After a while, I take off my jacket because even though it’s cold outside, the work is warming me up.

Gavin works much faster than Grandpa did. Within an hour, we have all four walls built and we’re ready to raise them. It’s pretty dark outside but the headlights on his truck are keeping things lit.

“Is that going to kill your battery?” I ask after we raise one of the walls. I hold it into place while he screws it into the foundation.

“I hope not,” he says.

I give him a look. He peers up at me, socket wrench in hand. From the lighting of his headlights, he looks unusually sexy. He grins.

“It’ll be fine. That’s a new battery.”

“Good,” I say, taking a deep breath. I hold his gaze longer than I should. Moments tick by and we’re still here, me standing near the framed wall, and him sitting on the foundation, looking up at me.

“Next wall?” he says after a painfully long moment where all I want to do is talk to him like we used to.

“Sure,” I say, my voice coming out all wrong.

He gets up and helps me position the next wall into place. A little while later, we have four standing framed walls of the greenhouse. My phone goes off in my back pocket again, but I ignore it. It makes me think of TJ’s name on my phone, and how Gavin’s is now saved as Contractor.

And honestly, that’s exactly who he is tonight. He hasn’t said a word that wasn’t work related. He’s just been working hard, building this thing by memory as if he’d memorized the blueprints I gave him. Every step he does is exactly in order.

“Thank you for this,” I say because I’m dying to say something. Being here with him, close enough to smell his cologne, it makes me long for the old days, even though I shouldn’t.

“No thanks are needed. This is my job.”

Just like a contractor, I think.

“Clarissa!” Mrs. Bradley calls out from across the way. I look up and can barely see her from the dim lighting at the daycare’s entrance. “Do you still need a ride home?”

I look at Gavin. “Sorry. I don’t have a car,” I say. “I would stay the whole time if I could.

“I can give you a ride home,” he says.

“Are you sure?” I ask.

“I’d love to.”

My stomach flickers with something like anxiety. I cup my hands to my mouth and call back to Mrs. Bradley, “I have a ride! Thank you though!”

She waves at me. “See you tomorrow!”

And then she’s gone, and I realize we’re the only two people out here. The kids have long since been picked up by their parents, and the teachers from the school next door are at home, carrying on with their lives. It’s just us out here in the cold.

Gavin and I assemble the frame for the roof. The silence is killing me. I study his features to see if maybe it’s killing him, too, but he doesn’t ever look at me. He just focuses on the task at hand.

“Sorry I didn’t read your letter,” I say, just because I need something to say. I miss the old us. The jokes and the banter and the fun we had.

“It’s no big deal,” he says after a moment. He doesn’t meet my eyes. “We should probably wait until daylight to put the roof on. It’d be safer that way.”

I nod slowly. I’m not ready for the night to be over, even though my fingers are frozen and my nose is cold and that hot chocolate was gone hours ago.

“Tomorrow?” I say.

“I have the weekend off, and if we’re lucky, we can get this finished by then.”

He walks around the back of his truck and lowers the tailgate. I follow him, and sit on the back of it with as much space between us as possible.

“That would be cool,” I say. “But wait, isn’t a cold front moving in?”

He shrugs. “It’s Texas. It doesn’t get that cold.”

“They said it might snow.” I remember hearing it on the news today while I was getting ready for school. “We should put it off until the weather is better.”

“I’m done putting it off,” Gavin says. He looks over at me and in the darkness, his sharp good looks make my stomach flutter. “I made you a promise and I’m following through on it as fast as I can.”

I exhale. “If it’s too cold, we’ll need to wait.”

He shakes his head. “I’m really sorry, Clarissa. This is the best I can do, and I’m doing it no matter what.”

I swallow. I wish he’d continue. I wish we could have that talk he begged me to have with him weeks ago. Now it all seems so distant, so unattainable.

“Come on,” he says, hopping off the tailgate. “I’ll take you home.”

On the short drive, the only sound is of the tires on the asphalt, and the low singing of an old rock song on his radio. My throat is filled with cotton balls and all I want to do is talk to him, but I can’t find the words. When he pulls into my driveway, I turn to him and smile.

“Thanks for the ride.”

“You’re welcome,” he says, but he’s not looking at me. “Have a goodnight.”

I climb out of his truck, heavy with the weight of all this regret on my chest. This is because of what he did, but I still wish it didn’t have to be this way. This Gavin isn’t the Gavin I used to know.

Tonight he was distant. A stranger.

He was a contractor—hired help. Not a friend.

Isn’t that exactly what I wanted from him?

And yet, even though we had no fun at all and all we did was work, I can’t help but think that I enjoyed these few hours with Gavin so much more than all the time I’ve spent with TJ this week. I should be happy when I’m with TJ, the guy who likes me and hasn’t lied to me.

But instead, I only feel at peace when I’m with the guy I can’t trust.

And that makes absolutely no sense at all.