Zack

Then she starts singing in a nasal voice. “Oh, I stuck my head in a little skunk’s hole, and the little skunk said ‘Well a-bless my soul.’

“And what did the skunk say, Ben?” she calls out in her regular voice.

“Take it out, take it out, take it out, remove it,” he sings.

Kate laughs and starts singing again while making the skunk dance. “Well, I didn’t take it out and the little skunk said, ‘If you don’t take it out you will wish you did.’ ”

“Take it out, take it out, take it out, remove it,” Ben sings at the top of his lungs.

Then the skunk disappears and I hear Kate blow the biggest, wettest fart sound I’ve ever heard, which causes Ben to roll onto his back and hold on to his stomach while he laughs. Kate’s head pops up and she’s holding her nose while she grins at Ben. “Phew! I removed it.”

Ben thrashes on the floor giggling, and Kate immediately sees me standing there, her eyes cutting to me with a sheepish grin. “Look who’s home, Whipper Snapper Zapper.”

Ben lifts his head to look at Kate, who nods toward me. Ben then tilts his head backward to look at me from upside down. When he sees it’s me, he immediately rolls, jumps to his feet, and yells, “Yay! Dad’s home.”

He runs on his little legs across the room, and by the time I uncross my arms from over my chest, he’s launching himself at me. It’s a feeling that every person should experience just once in his or her life…having your child running toward you with unfettered joy to be in your arms.

I pick him up, hoist him in the air, and blow a raspberry on his neck. His hands come up to clutch at my face as he tries to push me away because this always tickles him mercilessly. “Stop it, Dad.”

Lifting my face away, I look over Ben’s shoulders and see Kate has come out from behind the couch and is now pushing it back against the wall. She’s dressed no different than yesterday, except today it’s a baggy pair of khaki pants and a navy blue sweatshirt that swallows her up. Her hair is wrapped in a tight bun, and when she turns to me, she actually pushes her glasses up her nose with the tip of her finger.

Christ, she’s such a nerd, and I hope that shit doesn’t rub off on Ben. I want my kid to hang with the cool kids when he gets older.

“Do you want me to fix you a late breakfast?” Kate asks.

When I left to see Dr. Pannaker this morning, I didn’t have time to eat the eggs and bacon she was making. I shake my head, though, declining her offer. “I actually need to talk to you. We need to lay out some ground rules and go over your duties.”

“Sounds super-duper to me,” she says with a cheesy grin, and I wait for her to push her glasses up her nose again, but she doesn’t. “And after, if it’s okay with you, I thought I’d take Ben to the little neighborhood park you have. It’s going to be pretty mild outside and it’s such a beautiful day. I love that gorgeous blue Carolina sky. It’s a deeper shade of blue in the winter, but it just makes me itch to be outside.”

She says all of this without pausing to take a breath, and it’s done in such a singsong, joyous way, I can’t help but just stare at her. I have to wonder if she exhibits this much happiness and enthusiasm all the time, and if so, will it make me want to strangle her at some point? I’ve been stuck in a gray funk for so many months, her bubbly personality actually grates on me a bit. It’s like being in a dark room and coming out into the sunshine…the bright light welcoming, but painful at the same time.

“That’s fine,” I say, just hoping to get her to stop her rant over how beautiful the day is. I kiss Ben on the forehead and lower him to the ground. “Stay up here and play for a bit while Kate and I go talk in the kitchen, okay, bud?”

“Okay,” he says, and runs over to his toy chest. “I’ll play with my LEGOs.”

I turn away and head back down the stairs and into the kitchen. I can hear Kate following behind me.

“Want something to drink?” I ask her as I head to the refrigerator.

“I’m good,” she says genially, and I hear her slide a chair out from the table to sit down. “But thanks for the offer.”

I grab a bottle of water, uncap it, and walk over to the table. She watches as I approach, her eyes open and trusting of this new working relationship we will have.

As I pull my own chair out, I don’t take my eyes off her. I sit down, set my bottle on the table, and say, “There’s something about you that doesn’t sit right with me, and I personally don’t want you here.”

Chapter 4

Kate

There’s something about you that doesn’t sit right with me, and I personally don’t want you here.

Hmmmm.

Have you ever seen someone just ridiculously good-looking? Like a movie star or something? And you think there is nothing in the world that could ever make that person ugly. They just have such super-stellar good looks that they could be dunked in a vat of pig shit and still look fantastic.

But then that same person can do something horrible, or say something utterly mean and cruel, and it actually changes how that person looks to you. Makes their features look not as perfect, and twists their beauty into something unrecognizable.

Yeah, well, that’s not what happens here when Zack tells me he doesn’t want me here.

He’s still just as gorgeous as ever, and that’s because I can be objective in this moment right now.