Chapter 5

I’m confident my last words will be, “Are you fucking kidding me?”

-Travis’ secret thoughts

Travis

370 days ago

It was the first time I’d seen her with her kid.

It was the first time she’d seen me with mine.

“You look a little lost,” she said to me.

I gave her a dry look.

“What gave that away?” I teased.

She looked at me, surrounded by all the other moms at their Mommy & Me Tea Party at the school, and grinned.

“I think it was the fact that you’re the only man in a roomful of moms,” she countered back.

I winked at her and turned back to my tea.

I didn’t like tea. Well, let me rephrase that. I liked tea. What I did not like was tea that was not sweet. This green tea, or Earl Grey, or whatever the fuck it was, tasted like mold.

What I wouldn’t do for a huge glass of McDonald’s sweet tea right now to wash this disgusting taste out of my mouth. Or a beer, but I highly doubted that the school would approve of me bringing a cooler full of ice cold beer to their stupid Mommy & Me Tea bullshit.

However, there was not a single thing in the world that I wouldn’t do for my little girl, and if I had to sit at a Mommy & Me Tea brunch date with her at her school to make her smile, then I’d fucking do it. Twice, if I had to.

It had never occurred to me that she would be there, though.

She didn’t look like she’d had a kid, let alone did she look old enough to have one that was the same age as mine!

But it was what it was, and now I had something pretty to stare at beside my kid who was clearly not too happy being where she was at, and with who she was with.

She wanted her mother here.

I’d wanted her mother here.

Allegra, however, had something pressing to do, and decided to do that instead of this.

Knowing what this meant to my kid, I’d decided to bite the bullet and come. Unfortunately, I was straight off of a job, and I was covered in grease. It was ground into my pants, covered my shirt, and I was fairly sure that I had it in my hair.

Alex, being the phobic girl that she was, refused to even give me a hug.

A trait that came from her fucking mother. Her fucking mother who refused to do the exact same thing when I was dirty like I was, too.

Was it too hard to ask for a fuckin’ hug after a long day at work? Was it too much to ask for a woman to not care if her clothes got dirty?

Because that’s what I wanted. A woman that was going to love me unconditionally—dirt and all.

But Allegra had shown her true colors over and over again, and I fucking hated…

“You want some of mine?”

I looked over to find her pulling a chair out, sitting at the tiny mini-human desk right beside me.

She looked funny with her knees up by her chest, and I was sure that I looked just as silly—if not sillier.

“Yours what?” I questioned, looking at her.

“My tea.” She shook the glass.

I stared at the McDonald’s cup in reverence.

“What do you have?” I questioned.

She rolled her eyes and held out the glass. “Sweet tea.”

“You read my mind,” I told her but didn’t reach to take the glass. “But no, I’m not going to take your glass.”

She shook the cup, and the ice and tea inside of the cup swished. “Come on. I’m not going to drink any more. I’ve already had three of them when I had lunch with Wednesday.”

“Who is Wednesday?” Alex asked, a slight sneer in her voice. “What kind of name is Wednesday, anyway?”

Hannah’s eyes turned from me to my kid’s, and she grinned, smiling so beautifully that my heart actually squeezed.

“Have you ever seen the Addams Family?” she questioned. “There’s a girl that’s around your age in it. Her name was Wednesday.”

Alex didn’t crack a smile or even act like she was interested in anything that Hannah had to say.

In fact, the moment that Hannah started to talk, she turned her head away and looked at the women across the room from us.

I didn’t need to look at those women. They were friends of Allegra’s and had already expressed their distaste with having me here instead of Allegra—luckily not in front of my child, at least.

“Are you going to drink that, Mister?”

I looked over to see Hannah’s child staring at me expectantly.

I grinned and pushed my cup and saucer in her direction. “Have at it, pretty girl.”

That term of endearment had Alex’s head whipping around like I’d said something naughty, and I guess that in Alex terms, I might have.

Sweet Girl had been her nickname, along with many others that I’d termed her over the years since she’d been alive.

I hadn’t called her ‘Sweet Girl’ in a long time, and likely she realized that.

If I was being honest, Alex hadn’t been ‘sweet’ for a while.

Her mother had ruined her. Treated her like she was some higher person in society and like her shit didn’t stink.

Allegra and I had split a while ago—years if we were counting the amount of time in which we’d been together but not ‘together,’ at least in the biblical sense.

Since we’d separated, and later divorced, Allegra had made it a point to mold my daughter into the little asshole she’d turned into. It sucked. I missed my little girl.

This staring, glaring, name calling kid wasn’t the one that I knew and loved.

Sure, I still loved Alex, no matter what. But this kid wasn’t the one that had begged me to take her fishing. Wasn’t the one that had pleaded with me to ride in my ‘toe tuck.’

She was Allegra’s child. She was everything that I hated in Allegra.

“Thank you!” Hannah’s girl smiled, her flashy white teeth revealing one single tooth missing.

Which reminded me.

“Oh, hey, baby,” I turned to Alex. “Did the Tooth Fairy bring you some money for your lost tooth?”

I’d gotten a text from Allegra that Alex had lost her first tooth about a week ago. Yes, you heard that right. A week ago.

“The Tooth Fairy isn’t real, Dad.” Alex’s snide comment had me clenching my fists. “You know how Mommy doesn’t like to lie to me.”

Unlike you was left unsaid.

Excuse the fuck out of me if I wanted my kid to believe in the unreal for just a little bit longer. Excuse-fucking-me!

“What?” Hannah’s little girl asked in dejected surprise. “Mama?”

I winced, forgetting for a moment that we weren’t alone.

I looked over to Hannah apologetically.

“I’m sorry,” I told her. “We’re just gonna go sit over there.”

I got up and gave Alex a glare that clearly meant ‘move your ass or I’ll beat it.’

She moved.

I sat down on the next stupid white chair and turned my angry eyes to Alex.

“You know,” I told her, “that was a jerk move.”

Alex batted her eyelashes. “I don’t like her.”

I gritted my teeth.

“Who?”

“Either.”

“Why?” I questioned. “What did they ever do to you?”

Alex crossed her arms over her chest, and the move let her shirt that was already too low for my taste to begin with fall down even lower.

I held my tongue. Barely.

“Why are you even here?” she countered, refusing to answer my question.

“I’m here because I know that this meant so much to you,” I told her honestly. “And I know that you said something about wanting to go.”

She looked down at her lap, a trace of discomfort gracing her face before it fled altogether.

I could see the moment that she decided to be ugly instead of apologizing.

“Well, I don’t want you here.”

Two hours later, I was thankful that I had the choice of whether to take Alex home or not.

Thankfully, her mother would be here to pick her up from the Mommy and Me class, because I was so ready to go it wasn’t even funny.

My daughter was acting like a royal asshole, and I didn’t want to be around her any longer.

Sure, after I calmed down, I would be back to loving my kid no matter what, but right now, with her anger and rude words that she’d tossed at me over the last two hours, I was ready for it to be over.

I looked down and away from Allegra’s car, knowing from experience if I let her see me and stopped, I would be forced to talk to her.

I thought I’d gotten away with it, too. But then I heard my name.

I hesitated, but it was enough for Allegra to notice me. Then call out to me.

“You’re being paged,” Hannah whispered.

I felt Hannah’s hand on my bicep, and turned, pausing in my death march.

“I hear,” I muttered darkly. “I’m heading over now.”

She patted my arm and started to go, but I stopped her by reaching for her retreating hand.

“I’m sorry again for what Alex said,” I told her. “She’s been so rude lately, to everyone including me. But I never in a million years would’ve thought she’d reveal something like that.”

She smiled and reached up to pull a white string off the side of my shirt before replying.

“It’ll be okay. Reggie’s a tough girl. Reggie and I come from tough stock.”

I sighed. “Just wish you didn’t have to. She disappointed me today, and I’ll have a talk with her mother to be sure that that doesn’t happen again.”

“I know you heard me, asshole!”

I gritted my teeth and turned.

Only I made a mistake. I allowed Hannah to witness Allegra’s venom.

And in doing so, I familiarized the two women with one another, even if they weren’t formally ‘introduced.’

“I heard you, Allegra,” I told her bluntly, making my words steely and hard. “But I’m apologizing to another parent for your daughter’s rudeness. Please, give me a moment.”

Allegra’s eyes narrowed.

Wrong thing to say, apparently.

“You shouldn’t have to apologize for anything she did. Our child is perfect.”

I wanted to laugh at that.

Our child was anything but perfect. She was exactly like Allegra, and that sucked.

“Actually, there was something to apologize for. Excuse me for another minute.”

I turned my back on Allegra, which pissed her off even more.

And that was when I made my mistake.

I completely missed the anger on Allegra’s face, but I would be feeling it, even months later.

 

 

***

Present day

“Well, I don’t want you here.”

Where had I heard those words before?

My memories drifted away from that god-awful day.

That was the day that Allegra had found out about Hannah, and the last time that I ever willingly said anything to Allegra about Hannah.

The bitch was always in my face, and the moment she heard about Hannah and me, it was like the gloves had come off.

It would take me a while to see what Allegra was doing, but eventually, I’d caught on.

And now, I hated her even more.

“What do you mean your hours were changed?”

Hannah looked away.

“I got back to work, but since I wasn’t there the last six weeks, they decided that they wanted to change up the hours. I’m only working half the day now.”

Hannah’s words, although soft and unconcerned, were something concerning to me.

“Apply at the hospital in…”

Hannah was already shaking her head.

“I can’t,” she said. “That’s too far. I don’t want to work twelve hours, at least not yet. I can make it.”

I knew she could make it. I would make sure she could make it. But to do that, she’d have to give Reggie less…or likely herself since she wouldn’t allow Reggie to suffer.

I wouldn’t allow that.

“Did they tell you why the changes?” I inquired.

She looked away.

“Hannah?”

She shrugged.

“Hannah,” I snapped. “What is it?”

Hannah opened her mouth to say something, but then a patient pushed through the door.

Hannah waved me off and went to the man who was clearly struggling to breathe, and I was left with TJ in my arms, wondering what in the hell had happened.

It didn’t take me long.

As soon as Hannah left, the receptionist, Daneen, sidled up.

She was a middle-aged woman with graying brown hair, a quick smile, and a love for Hannah that made me happy that she had someone in her corner like that.

But with that came the fierce protectiveness.

“It was the woman with the black dress.”

My brows went up.

“What woman?”

Daneen looked at where Hannah had disappeared, and then back to me.

“A woman came in two days ago. She expressed her willingness to donate to the clinic. I only heard a little bit before the doctor disappeared with her into his office, but it was enough for me to hear that ‘some changes would have to be made’ before she invested.”