She playfully punched his shoulder. “Done for now.”
“Is that when you’re finally going to marry him?” her dad asked. “After graduate school?”
Her mom squeezed her recently married husband’s arm. “Don’t pressure her. School first, marry after.”
Gleaves made a grumbly sound, but he nodded.
Khai’s mom, however, barged in and said, “Why no pressure? She made such a beautiful baby. It is a waste not to make more.”
All three grandparents nodded and mumbled in agreement, and Jade rolled her eyes. “I’m nice, too, and hardworking and a lot of other things.”
Esme went to hug her girl. “Yes, you are. You make Mommy proud.”
“I’m proud of you, Mommy,” Jade said, earning a teary smile from her mom.
As Khai watched mother and daughter, he recognized he was the proud one. Four years ago, he’d thought he had too many women in his life to have room for another, but he’d been wrong. He’d had just enough room for two more, and his heart, he found, was very far from being made of stone.
He wrapped his arms around them and kissed Esme’s temple. “I’m proud of both of you.”
Esme smiled and asked Jade, “What do you think? Are you ready for Mommy to marry C?u Kh?i?”
Jade danced in place. “Really? This summer? The drive-through wedding in Las Vegas?”
Khai laughed. “You sound more excited than your mom.”
“Then you can adopt me, and you’ll officially be my dad,” Jade said.
Khai’s chest swelled, and not once did he tell himself it was a heat flash or a health problem. He knew exactly what it was.
When he looked at Esme, her green eyes softened, and she ran her fingers over his jaw. “Look at that smile and those dimples. You must love us a lot.”
“More than a lot. Are you sure you want to do it this summer? I can wait as long as you want.”
He’d already put Esme and Jade in his will, though they didn’t know—about the will itself or all the money they’d be inheriting from him because he had no idea what to do with it. That stuff wasn’t important.
All that mattered was that they’d be taken care of if something happened to him. Not that they needed him at all. Esme was a force to be reckoned with.
“I’m ready,” Esme said. Then her lips curved. “And I want to see Elvis.”
He laughed. “No one in Vegas is the real Elvis.”
Eyes sparkling, she said, “I know. But maybe they feel like Elvis inside. That’s the important part.”
He brought their foreheads together as he laughed again. “You’re definitely stranger than I am.”
“No way.”
He grinned.
She grinned back. “Em yêu anh.”
Without hesitation, he replied, “Anh yêu em.”
The words wrapped around and around them, drawing them together.
Em yêu anh yêu em.
Girl loves boy loves girl.
THE END
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Most of my childhood memories of my mom involve her sleeping. Either I’d stayed up late and managed to catch her coming home from work and climbing into bed, or I was sneaking into her bedroom in the morning before school and digging through her purse for lunch money, trying my best not to wake her up because I knew she’d worked ridiculous hours the day before and would do it all over again this day. She wasn’t the kind of mother that I saw on TV or that my classmates had, but while our interactions were short and far in between, they were enough for me to understand I was loved and she was proud of me.