Mickie
2009
I was officially done with my nursing classes. Forever.
I had taken my last test, which meant my Bachelor’s Degree in Nursing was basically in the bag. And I’d done it all in three years because I’d busted my ass, taken all the extra classes I could handle—including summer classes every year—and studied incessantly.
It helped to be a bookworm.
All I had left was to take all my RN exams, so that I could get my license and find an actual job.
But for now, I was celebrating.
Me: All done!! We still celebrating tonight?
My husband—because yeah, I had one of those now—responded to my text five minutes later.
Dawson: Congratulations, babe! I’ll take you to a nice dinner tonight, and we can see that movie you’ve been wanting to see. Sound good?
Something about his plan wasn’t completely satisfying my need to…let loose. I loved Dawson with all my heart and soul. But dinner and a movie had been our go-to date night idea lately. With my classes and his hectic hours as a beat cop, it was all we’d had the time and energy for.
But tonight, I wanted something more spontaneous. Something different and unexpected.
A light bulb clicked on.
My fingers flew over the keypad as I sent another text.
Me: CINDERELLA
My heart started racing as I waited for his answer.
Dawson: Really?? Tonight??
I smiled, and my blood ran faster.
Me: Tonight. Gatlin Station. 8pm.
Dawson: Oh, you’re on, babe. Try not to rip my clothes off when you see me.
Heat pooled in my belly at the memory his words provoked.
Me: Feel free to handcuff me if you think I’m not behaving myself, Officer.
Dawson: Be careful what you wish for, Mrs. Cruz.
Me: Not tonight, I won’t.
Dawson: Challenge accepted.
I drove ten miles over the speed limit all the way home in my eagerness to get ready for tonight. Something I realized was probably not good for a cop’s wife to do. Oh, well. All the guys at the station loved me.
Two years.
We had already been married for two years, which was still a crazy concept to me. I was someone’s wife. I had a husband. Two years under our belts, and it sometimes felt like I was still getting used to the idea.
We’d had our fair share of trials. I’d been in school non-stop since we met, and he had gone through the police academy and had been a beat cop the past two years. This had amounted to very little free time with each other at home, and a lot of stress piled on top of that.
But we’d made it work.
He had kept his promise to me, and was making efforts every day to keep me involved in what was going on with him and his family. And most importantly, what he was feeling.
I’d been around Mason and Parker so much at this point, they were like my own brothers. They’d even met Margot and her son, Milo, a few times, and had accepted them as part of their family as much as they had me. I’d only ever been around Dawson’s mother a few times after I first met her at the baseball game, and she always treated me with the utmost kindness.
His father, on the other hand…well, I’d only been around Sal once.
Not a very pleasant experience.
He and Dawson had gotten into a fight, and I’d had to drag my husband out of there before he beat the man to a bloody pulp.
That was the first time I’d really understood how complicated his family situation was. How strained his relationship with his parents was. And as weird as it sounded, it helped me understand Dawson better.
If anything, it made me love him even more.
He’d made something of himself in the face of some pretty awful circumstances, and I couldn’t be more proud of him.
I walked through the front door of our Baltimore apartment and immediately dropped all my bags onto the floor. The ritual felt good, because it was the last time I’d ever have to do it. Hell, yes.
In the spirit of that sentiment, I grabbed the open bottle of wine out of the fridge and drank straight from the bottle. Then I cranked up some Bob Marley on my iPod dock and loudly sang along to the lyrics.
Because I freaking could.
On Cinderella nights, Dawson knew to stay at the station to change and get ready. So, I had the entire apartment to myself for the next three hours.
My cell phone suddenly rang as I was undressing to hop in the shower.
Margot.
“Well, if it isn’t ‘Lil Mama herself,” I said in greeting.
Margot scoffed over the line. “Even with stretch marks and a seven-year-old, I’ve still got more swag than you.”
I laughed. “How is the offspring doing? Shoved any more rocks up his nose lately?”
Margot sighed the long sigh of a mother who was baffled by the things her child often did. “Nope. This time it was a live frog in his jeans pocket.”
I almost spit wine all over the bathroom mirror. “A frog? Um…why?”
“He said he saw it on the playground, and wanted to bring it home as his pet.” I could hear a washing machine running the background. “You know, since I won’t let him have a dog.”
I hummed in agreement. “Naturally, a frog is the next step.”
“When I found it as I was doing laundry, he said he’d been looking everywhere for Freddy,” she said. “He’d apparently lost him.”
I winced. “He’d already named him?”
“Yep. I was already beaten before I even knew I was in battle.”
When I heard a distinct ding in the background, I knew it meant Uncle Frank was sitting down in the living room, getting his daily Wheel of Fortune fix. I missed all of them.
“Well, look on the bright side,” I said. “At least he didn’t try to stick Freddy up his nose.”
“Small miracles,” she muttered. “What’s new in the world of Nurse Betty and Officer Horny Handcuffs?”
I rolled my eyes at her latest attempt to come up with the best porn names for us. “Just took my last test today. We’re going to go celebrate tonight.”
“Oh, celebrate,” she crooned. “Does that mean that Milo is going to have a little cousin about nine months from now?”
That was only the forty thousandth time she had inquired about mine and Dawson’s plans to have children ever since we’d gotten married.
“Hellooo,” I drawled. “I’m just now finishing college. I’m not ready for a baby yet. It’s more likely he’s going to get a little brother or sister before he gets a cousin.”
She huffed and I chuckled. “Well, thanks for jinxing me, you twerp.”
“Ah,” I mused. “I haven’t been called a twerp this millennia. Nice to hear the word survived our childhood.”
“Hey, motherhood diminishes your cuss word vocabulary,” she said. “Just wait ‘til you have kids. You’ll see.”
I snorted and took another chug of wine. “Not happening for a while, sis. Might as well accept that.”
“I will accept noth—Oh, my God!” I held the phone away from my ear when a whole lot of shuffling, static noises came over the line. “Honey, what are you doing in the dryer?” To me she said, “I have to go,” and abruptly hung up.
And that was why I wasn’t having kids anytime soon.
Mine and Dawson’s lives were already chaotic enough. I wasn’t ready to be responsible for another life until I got mine figured out first.
Speaking of my life with Dawson…
It was time for Cinderella to put on her glass slipper, and hop inside her big ass pumpkin.