I have left a lot of apartments in a hurry in the middle of the night, but I’ve never done it with a smile on my face before.

I wish I didn’t have to leave like that, and I’m kicking myself for forgetting about Charlie, but I guess there would have been no good way to make my exit from Nina’s place without exchanging information. No need to complicate things. But fuck. I have to go back to fix that drywall. Why did I do that?

Can’t think about it now. I need to get to my Dad’s place, like an hour ago. I text Michelle to let her know I’m on the way and wave down a cab on Smith Street. The driver gives me a look in the rearview mirror when I tell him I only want to go about ten blocks, but I promise him a good tip. Asshole.

Leaning back into the seat, I have nothing else to think about besides Nina for the next couple of minutes. I know without a doubt from the way she looked at me that no one has ever made her come like that before, and that makes me feel so damn good. This turned out to be the best dumb idea I’ve ever had. My hand doesn’t even hurt the slightest bit. All those endorphins I released took care of that. I can’t believe she got me a bag of frozen peas after I punched a hole in her wall. Who does that?

Nina.

Why would the principal leave a woman like that? I mean, I get the appeal of Sadie, obviously, but it’s mostly skin-deep. Mostly. Nina’s something else. Something fresh and real. I only got a taste of it, but it’s enough to know that any guy would be lucky enough to have her. Any guy who was good enough for her, that is. Mr. Principal isn’t good enough. I wish I were.

Michelle’s standing facing the door with her arms crossed, foot tapping when I let myself into my Dad’s Cobble Hill townhouse. I still can’t believe how nice this place is, every time I come here. The old guy made a great decision when he bought this place for Clara, even though she was such a mess. But if it weren’t for her, we wouldn’t have Charlie.

“Eleven-thirty,” she hisses. “No later than ten, you said. Should have known.”

I pull my Dad’s neighbor in for a hug. “Michelle, my belle.” She’s warm and squishy and I’m going to hug the anger out of her.

“Fuck you Jack!” she yell-whispers at me and spanks my ass. “I was this close to calling your father. I gotta work in the morning and you come back smelling like pussy, you dog.” She picks up her purse. “He’s in his room, not asleep.” She points her finger at me, inches from my face. “You gotta find a regular babysitter. A professional. It’s been months. I can’t do this every night if you guys are gonna be out plowing every woman in New York.”

“Aww, Mich. You know we only plow women in this borough.”

“Animal. If I had a daughter I would tell her to stay the hell away from you.” She’s grinning and her eyes are sparkling, but on some level it still hurts me to hear her say this.

“Darlin’ if you had a daughter who was anything like you I would have cleaned up my act and married her by now and you know it.”

All the tension slowly melts away from her face and she smiles and I get a rare glimpse of the beautiful young woman that still lives inside her tired stressed-out sixty year-old body. “I’m getting the hell out of here before you say another word.” She shuffles towards the door. “We baked cookies—don’t eat them all. Go say good night to your brother.”

“Good night, Michelle, thank you. Sorry I was late.”

She waves me away and is out the door, grumbling. I honestly don’t know what my Dad and half-brother would do without the ladies of this neighborhood. Even when Charlie’s mother was still around, they helped out with almost everything. It takes a village. At least it does when there’s just us three bonehead Devlin guys trying to raise a sweet kid who deserves better.

I make my way over to the closed door to Charlie’s room and knock on it softly. “It’s me, buddy.”

“Finally!” he says.

I open the door and find him reading in bed with a battery-operated light clipped to his book like a nerd. It’s hard to believe he got the book nerd gene from Clara’s side, but it sure didn’t come from my Dad…I remember seeing a lot of books around Nina’s place…But I can’t think about that now.

He doesn’t even look up from his book when I plop down on the edge of his bed. He’s so serious for an eight year-old boy. I’m always trying to lighten him up, but maybe he’s meant to be the anchor for this family.

“Whatcha reading?”

He tilts his book so that I can see the cover. Holes by Louis Sachar. My brother Gabe and I can’t say the title without laughing and thinking about the kinds of holes that this book is not about. Yeah. Charlie’s the mature one. “How many times have you read this one?”

He shrugs. He’s mad at me for coming home late. I don’t blame him. “Sorry I got here late.”

“Were you with Sadie?”

I haven’t told him about Sadie yet. She was his part-time nanny for about a year and a half, which is how I met her. Then a few months ago she got a full-time nanny job for some rich people’s kid. She was still coming around to hang out with Charlie on weekends for a while, but he misses her. I’ll tell him tomorrow. Not now. “She was busy.”

“With the other kid?”

“I guess.” Could be true, who knows. “Come on. Book down. You gotta go to sleep. You got camp in the morning. Hey—how was your first day?”

“I liked it.”

“Yeah?” He’s going to a day camp for the summer. Keeping kids busy and cared-for is so fucking hard, especially when school’s out—I honestly don’t know how people have been doing it every day forever.

“Yeah, but there are too many girls.”

“Too many, huh? Any good ones?”

He shrugs. “Some of them are okay, I guess. Rory’s cousin is in it and she keeps saying my name and laughing. It’s annoying.”

“Sounds like she’s got a crush on you.”

He wrinkles up his face. “Gross.”

“She hot?”

“Shut up.” He snaps his book shut and switches off the little light. “When’s Sadie coming over?” I think he knows something’s up. Kid’s got a sixth sense, it’s creepy.

“I dunno. We’ll talk about it in the morning. Go to sleep.” I put the book on the shelf under his bedside table.

“When’s Dad getting back?”

“Soon, probably.” My Dad just started dating a woman who lives in Park Slope. She’s surprisingly age-appropriate and I think she really likes her, but we all know better than to get our hopes up. He hit the jackpot once in his life, but when my Mom left this earth it’s like she took all his good sense with her. God bless him for always getting back up on that horse, though. I don’t know if I could if I’d been through what he has.

Charlie’s watching my face as he lies back on his pillow. I pull the covers up over him and mess up his hair. “You gonna sleep here?”

“Course. What do you want for breakfast?”

“Waffles,” we say at the same time.

“Okay, but we’re gonna have to put a few berries on them or something so we can pretend to be healthy.”

“Okay.”

“G’night.” I turn off the bedside lamp and the nightlight turns on. My older brother thinks Charlie’s too old to have a nightlight, but fuck him. We all need a little light in our lives. Charlie is ours. He should have whatever he wants.

After eating five of Michelle’s cookies and drinking a glass of water, I crash on the couch without washing up for the night. I want to be able to smell Nina on my fingers just a little while longer until I fall asleep.