I look over at Tim, who has a strained smile on his lips. “That’s right. I, uh… I live just down the block, and my mom sent over these cookies from Florida, and I thought…”
He thought he would bring me some cookies. Except he got more than he bargained for.
“Cookies?” Josh asks hopefully. It will be a sad day when my son gets too old to be excited about cookies. Although to be honest, I still get a little excited about cookies. But at the moment, I’m having trouble dredging up any enthusiasm for them. “Can I have some, Mom?”
“Sure,” I say tonelessly.
Tim looks down at the white box in his hand, as if he had forgotten he was even holding it. He shoves the box into Josh’s arms without taking his eyes off me. “They’re all yours,” he says.
“Mom.” Josh tugs on my arm. “How many am I allowed to have?”
“Um, one…”
“One? That’s it?”
“Okay, uh… two, I guess.”
“But what if they’re small?”
Oh my God, I would let him have the whole box if he would just leave the room right now. “You can have three if they’re small.”
“Yay!”
Josh takes off down the hall with the box of cookies, leaving me and Tim staring at each other in the hallway. Tim shakes his head. “That’s your son? That’s Josh?”
“Yes…”
The confusion on his face almost makes me want to reach out and hug him. “You told me he was in kindergarten.”
“I never told you that.”
“But you…” He glances over my shoulder. “Can we talk outside for a minute?”
I’d really rather not, but I have a feeling I don’t have a choice in the matter. This is a conversation we need to have, as much as I’ve been dreading it. And I don’t want to talk about this within earshot of my son, and Tim knows it.
We step out onto my front porch, shutting the door behind me. I’m standing only a foot away from Tim, and I can almost make out the remnants of the freckles he used to have. I used to know his face so well, even better than my own.
We were inseparable when we were kids. And we thought it would always be like that—Tim especially. When we were six or seven, he used to talk about the future in a way that always included me. He’d say things like, When we get married, we should get a big house with five bedrooms. Sometimes I got the feeling he never stopped thinking that way—he just stopped saying it out loud.
“Brooke,” he says quietly, “how old is Josh?”
I shut my eyes for a moment, hoping maybe when I open them, this will all be a really awkward dream. Then I open my eyes again.
Nope. Not a dream.
“He’s ten,” I say.
“Ten?” Tim’s hand is shaking as he runs it through his hair. “He’s ten years old?”
“Right.”
“So does that mean Shane is…？”
He doesn’t need to finish the question. We both know what he’s thinking. I may as well tell him the truth. He deserves that.
“Yes,” I say. “He is.”
“Oh God.” Tim looks like he’s going to be sick. “I had no idea that you…”
“Well, now you know why I left town.”
“Yeah, but…” He stares at the door to my house. “Does Josh know who his father is?”