He put all the things back in the box and shoved it back into the bag. On the desk the computer beeped and blinked. He had an email. Mandy had replied all ready. She wasn't showing as online for chat, but there was the reply.
Red Deer. I love living here. It's a fun city, a little city, comparatively. Colton's dad's office was out of here, so he lived here. He convinced me if we three moved here and lived together, we could be a family. So we did. And I had a good job here, a secure job and a good sitter and Colton was in a good school. So we didn't move. If you ever want to check it out, let me know. I'll give you a tour. We can catch up. Y'know. and I'd love to maybe talk We come to Calgary infrequently, but it happens. My phone number is: 314-5570. Give me a call between five and nine, or on the weekends, I'm pretty well home most of the time. Or I keep my phone sent to my cell phone. Unless we are at the pool, okay well, I am babbling now. So I hope to hear from you soon-MG Kip smiled at the screen. She was nervous. She babbled in her email, repeating herself a little. Giving him a little more information than she had planned. He could imagine her, trying to superimpose her new image with the Mandy he remembered, sitting at a computer desk, typing out her message. Pushing send before she rethought her words and deleted the extra information. Was she still the shy girl he'd first met in high school? She never really left it behind, even through their relationship, she never reached out to his friends. She didn't make any during the rest of high school. But, she had many once they hit Saskatoon and university. She opened up completely.
He raised his eyebrows over her choice of words. If you want to check it out? Was that an invitation? If it was it was a tentative one. He didn't blame her for that. This was foreign territory for them both. There it was in black and white, her phone number. He could pick up the phone and in a few moments be hearing her voice.
Not right now, he wasn't prepared for that kind of contact. There was the whole 'Mandy had a kid' aspect he still had to assimilate as well. Where was his father in all this? Was there a relationship there?
Kip clicked back to the previous message. It said she lived with her son Colton. No mention of any man. She didn't say 'single mom' specifically. But all her words pointed to that being the case.