Chapter 63
Colby
I’m striding up Lydia’s walkway, here to pick up Izzy for the Daddy-Daughter Dance—which, I’ve been assured, is commonly attended by not only actual daddies but also by uncles and stepfathers and other assorted non-daddy father figures, too. And then—hallelujah!—after the dance, I’ll be spending the entire night at Lydia’s place for the very first time. I’ve been jockeying to get a full-night sleepover invitation from Lydia for weeks now, and it finally came through a couple days ago as a result of me telling Lydia about the location of my firefighter fitness test tomorrow morning.
“Hey, babe,” I told Lydia. “I just found out my fitness test on Saturday morning is being administered at the main firehouse near you, as opposed to the station where I used to work closer to my condo.” And that’s all it took. Without hesitation, Lydia told me to bring an overnight bag when I came to pick up Izzy for the dance.
And now, here I am, ascending the steps of Lydia’s porch, said overnight bag in my right hand, a corsage of little pink roses in my left, and Ralph loping excitedly alongside me. And I feel like I’m walking on air.
It’s been six weeks since Lydia and I first “engaged in romantic relations” that mind-blowing night together at my condo. And since then, our life has been filled with the quiet, simple joys of two people in love slowly morphing into a family of five. There have been regular dinners at Lydia’s place. Bath times for Bea. Lunch-making, dish-cleaning, bedtime stories, and a backyard latch needing fixing. There have been dancing and guitar and ukulele shows. A Jasmine-themed birthday party for Beatrice followed a couple weeks later by a Harry-Potter-themed one for Izzy. Family days at the aquarium and the zoo on Lydia’s days off. And, of course, plenty of sexy times in Lydia’s bedroom when I’ve rung Lydia’s bell so fucking hard and often, she’s had to shove a pillow over her face to keep from waking the kids.
It’s been an idyllic six weeks. Magical. Perfect. Well, other than the fact that I’ve been chomping at the bit to finally spend the night and not have to drive back home in the wee hours with Ralph giving me the stink-eye. And now, finally, I’m going to have my cake and eat it, too.
I take a deep breath and ring Lydia’s doorbell with my knuckle, electricity coursing through my veins.
Immediately, a high-pitched squeal rises up on the other side of the closed door. Four seconds after that, the door swings open, Ralph barges in, and the gap-toothed wiggler who owns my heart like none other stands before me in a pink, shimmering gown.
“Colby!” Isabella shrieks. She puts her palms on her little cheeks like the Home Alone kid. “You look beautiful!”
I chuckle. “Hey, that’s my line. You look beautiful tonight, Izzy Stardust. Turn around for me, sweetie. I want to see your pretty dress.”
Isabella twirls for me, her hands curved over her head like a jewelry-box ballerina, and I ooh and aah as I stride into the house.
“Whoa,” Lydia says when she sees me standing in her living room. “Hunky McHunkerton!” She plants a little kiss on my lips. “I’ve never seen you in a suit before. You look like a trillion bucks.” She slides her fingers up and down the lapel of my designer suit jacket and winks. “I’ve always had a thing for a sharp-dressed man.”
I kiss her and decide now isn’t the time to break the news that Ryan is the sharp-dressed man she’s swooning over, not me. It’s not that I’m a Neanderthal when it comes to dressing up. I own a sport coat that was tailored to fit me to a tee and always solicits compliments. But, tonight, given the importance of the occasion to Izzy, and the fact that I’ll be one of only a handful of “non-daddy” escorts at the dance, I decided my sport coat simply wouldn’t do.
If I’d had my usual paycheck to work with these days, rather than the slightly lesser disability checks I’ve been getting since the fire, I might have bit the bullet and bought myself a suit for tonight, regardless of the fact that I can count the number of times I’ve worn a tie on one hand. Actually, even with my tight money situation these days, I still probably would have splurged, regardless, if I thought I’d need a suit for Ryan’s wedding early next year. But, last I heard, Ryan’s leaning toward tuxedos for his groomsmen and me. So that was that.
And it’s not like I’m going to need a suit for my own wedding any time soon. As far as I’m concerned, I’m already married to Lydia—completely committed in my heart and soul to both her and the kids—so why go through the motions of saying vows in front of our families and friends? A guy is either committed to his woman or he’s not. That’s a fact. I know married guys at the station who fuck around on their wives. Plenty of them. And unmarried dudes who are as loyal as the day is long. And I also know one particular woman, the love of my life, who’s already been to hell and back after saying those sacred vows. A woman who promised to love her high school sweetheart “’til death do us part” and then got the shitty-ass, short-end of that stick. So I’ve got to figure, “Why on earth would Lydia want to go through saying those stressful words again?”
I suppose if I thought Lydia had any desire to get married, then I’d do the wedding thing for her. But Lydia hasn’t even hinted at wanting to get married and I’d just as soon not put her or myself through the ritual.
Okay, yeah.
I’m not being completely honest.
If I’m digging really deep into the honesty bin, the truth is I’m not sure I want to put myself through the ordeal of a wedding. Frankly, as harsh and insecure as it sounds, I don’t know if I could stand up there and look into Lydia’s hazel eyes and not wonder if Lydia was thinking about the time she said the exact same vows to Darren. If maybe she was wishing things hadn’t turned out the way they did with him because she’d so much rather still be married to the great love of her life, if given the choice, rather than to me. Yeah, I’m not proud of it, but at the end of the day, I’m not sure I could stand up there in a tuxedo in front of everyone I love and look into Lydia’s amber eyes and hear those sacred words coming out of her mouth... and wonder if she was feeling like I’m her consolation prize.
As Izzy hugs me and Lydia gets some love from Ralph, I put my overnight bag down and glance around the quiet living room. “Where are Bea and Theo? In their rooms?”
“Bea’s in her room playing dress-up and Theo’s at a sleepover. Apparently, he and his two buddies are writing songs for their new band.”
“Nice.”
“Did Theo tell you they finally picked their band name?” Lydia asks.
“No. What is it?”
Lydia grins. “Three guesses.”
“That’s kind of cool.”
“No.” She laughs. “I’m giving you three guesses.”
“Oh.” I laugh. “The Smart-Alecs? The Rock Climbers? Oh, I know! Twenty-three Goats?”
Lydia giggles. “The Bed Wetters.”
My mouth hangs open. “No way.”
“Yep.”
“Oh my God. That’s amazing. The fact that Theo can—”
I feel a tug on the bottom of my suit jacket. “Can we go now, Colby?” Izzy says insistently, her hazel eyes blazing up at me. “I don’t want to be late.”
I smile at my beautiful date for the evening. “It’s still a bit early, honey. We’ll leave in ten minutes. Oh, I almost forgot.” I hand Isabella the corsage of pink buds and she gasps like I’ve gifted her with the Hope Diamond. “Man, you’re easy to please, Izzy Stardust,” I say, chuckling. I slip the delicate pink roses onto Izzy’s slender wrist and she stares at it and swoons.
“Thank you,” she says. “Oh, thank you.”
I chuckle. “You’re very welcome, sweetie.”
“Okay, you two lovebirds,” Lydia says, holding up her phone. “Stand over there in the good light for a prom photo.”
Izzy and I position ourselves where Lydia has indicated, but our photo shoot is interrupted when Beatrice tears into the living room, click-clacking on plastic heels, decked out in a Disney-princess dress and smudged, pastel makeup that looks like it was applied during an earthquake. When she reaches me, Beatrice throws her arms around my knees and shouts, “I wannaguhdadda-dadda-daaaaaance-too!”
I burst out laughing and look at Lydia for a translation. “What?”
Lydia rolls her eyes. “She wants to go to the Daddy-Daughter Dance, too. She’s been demanding to go for the past thirty minutes, ever since she found out, for the first time, that such a thing even exists.”
I get down on one knee in front of my nemesis. “Hey, Newman.” I touch one of her rouge-filled cheeks. “When you’re Izzy’s age, I’ll take you to the Daddy-Daughter Dance, too, if you still want to go with me by then.”
But Beatrice isn’t having it. “I wanna go to da daddy-dadda-dance, too—now!”
I look at Lydia and she flashes me an exasperated look that says, “Lord, have mercy on my soul.” I look at my watch and then at Bea again. “You know what, honey? I’m here super early. Why don’t you and I have our own little Daddy-Daughter Dance right here in the living room for a few minutes before I take Izzy to her dance?”
I glance at Izzy as if to say, “Aren’t I smart?” and for the first time since I’ve known her, Izzy Decker looks fucking pissed at me... which, of course, means Beatrice looooooves my brilliant idea.
“But you’re mine, Colby,” Izzy says with surprising fire. “You can be Beatrice’s when it’s her turn for the Daddy-Daughter Dance. Tonight, you’re mine.”
“Mine,” Beatrice says, grabbing my knees again, this time even harder.
Izzy literally stomps her foot with frustration. “No! He’s not yours, Bea! He’s mine. I’ve been waiting for the Daddy-Daughter Dance my whole frickin’ life!”
I bite my lip, trying not to laugh. I’ve never heard Izzy “curse” before. I glance at Lydia, expecting to find her looking upset, but, to the contrary, she looks as amused as I feel. But because Lydia Decker is nothing if not a kick-ass momma, she quickly puts on her game face. “Okay, girls, enough with this ‘mine’ business. And we can do without the ‘frickin’,’ too, Isabella Rose.”
“Sorry.”
Lydia continues, “Colby is everyone’s. Yours, Beatrice’s, Theo’s, and mine. He loves us all and we love him. He’s belongs to all of us.”
My heart skips a beat.
“But, Mommy!” Izzy protests.
“Isabella. It’s not going to take away from your happiness to let Beatrice have happiness, too.”
“Yes, it is, Mommy! It iiiiiiis!”
I don’t mean to do it, but I chuckle. Oh my God.
Lydia flashes me a warning look, telling me to keep my laughter under wraps, dude, and I cover my mouth with my hand. As Lydia pulls Izzy over to the couch for a powwow, Beatrice grabs my leg and squeezes tight, claiming me for herself.
“Listen to me,” Lydia says, settling herself onto the couch and touching Isabella’s tear-streaked face. “Love is infinite. Do you know what that word means—infinite?”
Izzy nods and sniffles. “Like outer space.”
“That’s right. Never-ending. It’s the opposite of everything you can see and touch. Take a cake, for instance. There are only a certain number of slices of any particular chocolate cake, right, and then it’s all gone?”
Izzy nods again.
“But imagine if you had a special Infinity Cake. Every time you finished the last piece of it, another cake popped out a chute and plopped right onto your table, and it was just as moist and delicious as the one before it.”
Izzy giggles. “I’d like that.”
“Wouldn’t that be nice? If you had an Infinity Cake, you wouldn’t care if Beatrice ate a piece, would you? Or even if she ate the ‘last’ piece, because there’d be no such thing as a last piece. You could both have as much cake as you wanted, any time. And that’s exactly how it is with love. It’s like an Infinity Cake. And guess what else? Love isn’t just infinite, it’s also indivisible. That means it can’t ever be divided or cut into slices. Everyone always gets a whole cake.”
Oh, for the love of fuck.
Thwap.
I feel like I just got hit upside the head with a very big “Now do you get it, dumbshit?” stick.
Oh, my God, I’ve been such a fool. An immature, idiotic, jealous, insecure little fool. Love is infinite and indivisible. Of course, it is. Of course. I suddenly understand how Lydia can love me and Darren infinitely and wholly, without one love slicing into the other. And all it took was hearing Lydia explain the way love works—that it’s not a zero-sum game—to an eight-year-old.
Darren isn’t my competition in a race entitled “The One Lydia Loves the Most”! Because loving Lydia isn’t a race. Or, if it is, then it’s a relay race and Darren is my teammate in it, not my rival. Yes! It’s suddenly so clear to me. Darren ran the first leg of our relay race for our team, and now he’s handed off the baton to me.
“Do you understand, honey?” Lydia says to Izzy.
I nod, even though she’s not talking to me.
Lydia adds, “Love is an Infinity Cake.”
“I understand, Mommy,” Izzy says sweetly. But then she looks at her little sister across the room, who’s presently got her arms wrapped around my legs, and Izzy’s eyes darken and turn to daggers. “But if Beatrice makes me late for the dance, I swear to God I’m going to take her Princess Jasmine purse and cut it up into a hundred pieces and then throw it into the trash.”