Yours, Mine & Ours (9 page)

“What?” Amanda finished one of her daughter's hands, then started on the other.

“Daddy wasn't even
there
half the time. And he didn't play any games with me. But when he was there, you know what he did?”

“What, honey?”

“He and that lady took me to the back of the house, opened the door and said, ‘Ta da!' And there was this room where I'm supposed to sleep when I'm there. It had a big white chair. And a big white bed. And shelves that already had books in them. And lots of stuffed animals all over the place.”

Amanda felt her heart clutch. “It sounds very pretty.”

Molly glowered at her mother. “I know it's pretty. That's not what was wrong. What was wrong is that
I don't sleep there
. Which I told them. Daddy said, ‘But you will.' And the woman said, ‘And when you
come and stay with us, we want you to have your own special place.'”

Molly started blowing on both hands, trying to dry the polish faster. “I didn't say what I wanted to say. I remembered that I was supposed to be good, so I said, ‘The room's real nice. Thank you.' And then I said, ‘But I'm not sleeping over. Ever.' And you know what?”

“What, sweetheart?”

“The lady called me a brat.
Me. A brat!
”

“Oh, dear.”

“So then I told her she was ugly. Which she is. And I said she must be stupid, too, because she couldn't even win at Candy Land. And she didn't even know to cut the crusts off my sandwich, either!”

Amanda had to zip her mouth closed. Obviously she couldn't say what she really wanted to, such as that she'd like to whack Thom upside the head—and that went double for The Bitch. She'd particularly like to tear out The Bitch's heart for trying to win over her daughter with material crap, and even more wanted to scream at her ex for not spending parenting time with his daughter himself.

But she couldn't just agree with Molly, because that would fuel her daughter's unhappiness with Thom.

So she just listened. And once they finished all the nail painting, she cuddled her daughter on the deck rocker until Molly was sleepy enough to fold into bed. Tomorrow, when the little one was less upset,
Amanda figured she'd think of some positive, constructive things to say about the day's debacle.

Tonight, she wasn't up for it.

For a half hour, she cleaned up toys, threw in a wash load, wiped down the kitchen. The whole time she was building up a good serious brood.

The whole evening had exemplified—painfully—why she had to quit playing attraction games with her next-door neighbor. The divorce was still fresh for her daughter. Molly had to be her one hundred percent primary concern. And just as relevant, Amanda knew perfectly well that her marriage, and divorce, established her stupid judgment about men.

There was no trusting her feelings for Mike. The magic, the pull, the wonder…that was the fairy tale. The wanting to believe there was a hero, a knight, a good man just for her. The wanting to believe in “in love.”

The feeling that she was already
in
love with the damn man.

This was all exactly why she'd given up sex. Because she couldn't trust herself. Because she wanted her daughter to grow up seeing a strong, self-reliant mother…not a dependent female who couldn't get along without a man.

She had to
show
her daughter that she was strong, not just tell her.

Which meant she needed to just cool it with Mike. At least, for a much longer period of time.

That all settled in her mind, Amanda started turning out lights, closing up, locking the doors. When she climbed the stairs for bed, at the top stair she glanced out the window.

Night had fallen in a whisper of dew and stardust. Mike was upstairs, in his second-story window. He'd turned off his lights, too. He was probably enjoying just a few moments of peace and silence, probably no different than she was…but then he spotted her.

She could have moved. Could have waved. Could have…done pretty much anything.

But somehow heat transmitted across the driveways, through the closed windows, somehow past all the reasons she needed to get a serious brain.

She didn't just feel a pull toward him. She felt a force field.

He put a hand on his window.

Like a damn fool romantic idiot, she put a hand on her window.

And then, before she could do anything more stupid, she whipped around and headed straight, no talking, no thinking, no deterrents, to her bed. Alone. The way she needed to be.

R
ain shivered down the windows, starting at daybreak. Clouds bunched and punched, building into a dark gloomy morning even before breakfast. As Mike poured coffee, he studied his son.

Teddy had come home yesterday in a rare silent mood. He'd been contentious, crabby, couldn't settle in to play anything, wouldn't talk. Mike hadn't pushed him. Hell, the kid was as male as he was. Neither of them wanted to talk about
feelings
…but Mike figured a good night's sleep might help clear the air.

He'd set up the playing field to make talk easier. Let Teddy turn on cartoons—which Mike hated; he didn't like kids doing the whole veg-out-in-frontof-the-TV thing. But cartoons and scrambled eggs
invariably brought out conversation, particularly when Teddy was allowed to eat in the living room.

His tough guy was curled up on the couch, still wearing his dinosaur pj's, Slugger glued to his side—a sure sign that Teddy was upset. Still, the kid had the remote. And a deep bowl of the scrambled eggs—this, because Mike had learned early on that the deeper the bowl, the less chance of spilled eggs all over the house.

Mike took the recliner with his plate and a mug of coffee. “So, hey. You never said anything about the zoo yesterday. You did go, didn't you?”

“Yeah.”

“So, was it as fun as you thought it'd be?”

“It was fun for one whole second. Until George started sneezing and sneezing.” Teddy, who rarely had power over the remote, was channel surfing at dizzying speeds. “He was the one who said he
wanted
to go. That was the thing. He kept saying we'd have fun. Only, he already
knew
he was 'lergic to animals.”

Mike was already forming a wincer of a picture. “Okay. Then what happened?”

“We had to leave. That's what happened. Because he couldn't stop sneezing. But he said he'd make it up to me. We'd go to a nice place for lunch.” Teddy froze on a different cartoon, then hit the trigger again.

“And?”

“And I thought he meant McDonald's. Chuck E. Cheese. Burger King. Someplace
good
. Instead it was
this place where you had to wait and wait and wait. It had a tablecloth, and I didn't mean to pull it, but it was itching at my knees. So his drink got acc'dentally spilled. It wasn't my fault.”

“What else happened?”

“We went back to their place. Mom played cards with me. Go Fish. Crazy Eights. Then I said, ‘You wanna go swimming?' She said, ‘Maybe another time.' I said, ‘You wanna do a movie or something?' She said, ‘Sure.' Only, she just turned on the TV. Not like going to a movie. And when she got a movie on, then she just left, started doing things. Talking on the phone. Talking to
him.
Cooking. Junk like that. Dad?”

When Teddy left the trigger at a news channel, Mike knew exactly how upset his tough guy was. “What, sport?”

“Mom doesn't want to be with me. She doesn't even like me. I want to be
here.
With you. All the time. I don't want to go with her anymore. And you know what else?”

“Tell me.”

“George said I was rude. And he said I wasn't 'siplined.”

'Siplined? Mike thought. “Disciplined?”

“That's what I
said,
” Teddy said crossly. “And I said to mom on the way back, ‘I don't get it. Why you're with him when you could be with Dad.' That's when he said I was rude.”

Mike winced. “You asked your mom while he was right there in the car, huh?”

“Well, yeah. I didn't ask before. I wasn't thinking about it before. I asked her when I was thinking about it.” Teddy put the bowl on the floor, then burrowed deeper into the cushions. Slugger burrowed after him. Cat suddenly leaped on the couch, looking fierce and lionlike. “This is how I like it, Dad. Us guys together. No more girls.”

Mike remembered last night…whenever it was…when his house and Amanda's house were both closed down for the night, and he'd just stood at the window for a moment, inhaling the quiet…and there she was.

He wasn't touching her. Wasn't thinking about her. He'd been thinking about his kid. And her kid. And what divorces did to kids, and why he needed to get back to the Celibacy Principle. But then he'd looked at her and felt that…yearning.

Yearning to be with her.

To talk to her. To touch her. To hold her and be held.

This morning, of course, turned into another wake-up call. Yearning was just yearning. Sex was just sex. It wasn't the time. Period.

“Did you hear that?” Teddy grumbled.

“Yeah.” Mike bounced up from the recliner, not certain if the sound was an actual knock on the back door—but something had provoked Slugger into going
into his nose-to-the-sky warning bay. Of course, some days, a purr of a breeze could do that.

In this case, though, a pint-size rock star stood at the back door—at least Mike thought Molly's getup was about that. The sunglasses were unnecessary for a stormy morning, but the little shirt was full of glistening stars. Her red hair was all braided and pinned up with sequins or jewels or something. Her nails were painted like rainbows and her shoes had flashing lights.

At four years old, she had a petrifying amount of estrogen.

She might even be as bad as her mother in a few years.

Right then, though, he figured they had a more immediate problem on their plate. Molly was out of breath from running. Her lower lip was trembling, her big eyes spattering tears. “Mr. Mike. I need a punger. Right now. Right
right
now. For my mom!”

“A punger,” Mike said blankly.

“A punger! You know! A punger!” Quickly she said, “
Please!
This is
serious!
”

“A punger,” Mike repeated, but then he got it. Plunger. Plumbing problems. Some kind of major uh-oh. “Tell your mom I'll be right there.”

“It needs to be
now.
”

“I understand, Molly. I just need to get a tool kit and the plunger.”

“But don't tell mommy I told you. She told me to
sit in the living room, that she could handle it. But there was water
everywhere.
And she was saying bad words. I'd tell you what the words were, but I can't say them. My mommy says that nobody says those words in her house. Or my house. My mom—”

“Okay, honey. We're going to stop talking now, and start moving.” He pushed on shoes, then grabbed tools, locked up the baying Slugger and herded Teddy out with him. He suspected Amanda might just guess that someone had “told” on her—particularly when he showed up with a plunger and tools—but that wasn't remotely relevant.

Keeping his hands off her was one issue.

Not helping her if she was in trouble was completely different.

He yelled a hello when he opened her back door. “Oh, it's you, Mr. Mike!” said the rock star in her loudest voice. She was still wearing the shades. “What a surprise! It's Mr. Mike, Mom!”

“Molly Ann! Did you go next door and—”

“Me?” But to Mike, she lifted her head and whispered, “I'm in trouble.”

“I'll fix that. You and Teddy either play or watch some TV for a little while, okay?”

It wasn't hard to locate Amanda. The place had deteriorated since he saw it last. There seemed to be a whole bunch more purples and pale blues. Pillows. More pillows. Stuff to run into, stuff on top of tables. Flowers all over the place. But the main downstairs
bathroom—where the descriptive vocabulary was coming from—had water seeping into the hall.

She must have heard him set down the tool kit, because she started talking—even though she hadn't wasted a second turning around. “Go away, Mike. I can fix my own problems! I am not looking for someone to save me every time I get into some stupid mess!”

“Okay.”

“This would
not
be a good time to laugh.”

“Okay.”

“Don't say one word! I mean it! Just go back home!”

Weeellll. He couldn't quite say okay to that. The bathroom had definitely been redefined since his last visit. Now it seemed to be covered in butterflies. Butterfly wallpaper, butterfly pictures, butterfly toilet seat, towels embroidered with butterflies. It was almost enough to give a guy a rash—if he'd had the time to itch.

Amanda was pretty wet. Knees, feet, clothes. Towels had been used to sop up the water—or some of it. A few rolls of paper towels had been used for the same purpose. At some point she'd had a book open—
Basic Plumbing Repairs
—but that likely wasn't helping her a whole lot at this point, because it was like learning to sail after your boat had already capsized.

“I do
not
want advice. Don't you say one word!”

“I won't, I won't.” He was still trying to evaluate the situation. Not the plumbing problem. Her. Amanda was the only problem that mattered. She wasn't crying, exactly. At least there were no sissy, sad tears leaking down her cheeks. This was more…a major, furious, sputtering type of crying.

He said carefully, “Behind the toilet is a shutoff valve.”

“You think I didn't know that?” She huffed.
“Where?
”

“Just behind there. Look. You'll see it. Turn it off—against the clock. If it's too tight or hard to move, I could—”

“
Do not touch
anything.
I will do
it. And don't tell me any more, either!”

“Okay.” It was amazing…almost from the minute he'd met her, he'd been tensed up. It was that relentless attraction thing. But now, finally, he could relax. He didn't have to worry about falling in love with her anymore. She was a shrew. A witch times ten. She had a completely unreasonable and irrational side.

“Do we know what went down the toilet that shouldn't have?” he asked delicately.

“An American Girl doll shoe.”

“A doll's shoe,” he repeated.

“Possibly both shoes. She was dressing the doll when she went potty. Now the shoes are gone. And right after she left the bathroom, this all—” she motioned “—started.”

“Okay. Now, has the toilet run before? I mean, constantly run?”

“I just moved in this house. It was new, but not brand-new. Is there some reason in the
universe
I should know that answer for sure?”

“No, no,” he said in his best tiptoe voice. “It's just that the more we know, the better chance we have of understanding the whole problem.”

“
I'm
the
only
one who has to understand
anything.
”

“You're so right.” Hell, his pulse was practically humming. At the moment, she was as easy to love as a stingray. A splotchy-cheeked, furious, unmanageable stingray. “Amanda, I don't know if you have an auger, but I happened to bring one over. I wasn't going to use it myself. But you could. If you wanted to.”

“I don't even know what a flipping auger is! Go home, Mike!”

“I'm going. I promise. In just a second. I just want to show you the auger… See? On one end, it has a corkscrew. So you push that end down into the hole…then you turn the handle—clockwise—until the entire spring has been fed into the pipe as far as it'll go. The idea is to reach the obstruction…”

She tried. The first time she didn't quite get it, and shot him a look filled with venom. Probably snake venom.

“I won't offer to do it, I swear,” he promised, hands in the air. “It's just…you could try it again. In fact,
you could try it a couple of times. If you wanted to. And when this is all over, you might want to put some ice on that elbow.”

“I'm not hurt.”

“I'm sorry. I didn't mean to say anything nice. It just slipped out…and yeah, you've got it now. That's the how of it. So when the auger's all the way in, you could try—only if you want to!—to slowly, slowly pull the spring back. If that doesn't free up the doll's shoe, you could try it a second time.”

Thank God it worked. Out came a little white shoe. Amazing how much trouble a shoe less than two inches long could cause a person in life.

She started breathing a little better. Not a
lot
better. But definitely an improvement over the hyperventilating, crying, fire-breathing dragon she'd been a half hour ago.

“Okay now. I'm leaving. I'm going to take a wild guess that you don't have an indoor-outdoor vac—why would you? So I'll just bring mine over, leave it on your deck. It should suck up this water in no time. But before I leave…maybe you might want to turn on the water again. Remember? The shutoff valve? This time you turn it the other way.”

“I hear patronizing in your voice.”

“I swear. There isn't a patronizing thought in my head.” His tone probably sounded virtuous because he was telling the complete truth. There was nothing
on his mind but fear. He just wanted to get out of the house alive.

When she did the shutoff-valve thing and the crisis was finally completely over—except for the cleanup—she started crying again.

This time, he just backed away. There was a time to hold a woman. And a time when a man knew he'd sure as hell better get out of Dodge.

He was in bare feet by then, but he picked up his sandals by the back door, went searching for Teddy and Molly. The two were lying on the floor, leaned up on their elbows, watching TV. Only not cartoons. They were watching a mother give live birth. Apparently the event had just happened.

“Holy mother of…” Mike got calm, fast. In three long strides, he grabbed the remote, clicked off the TV and set it high on the mantel. “Molly. Do yourself a
big favor
and don't tell your mother what you were just watching. You can tell her another day. Just not today.”

“I won't, Mr. Mike. Princess and Darling and me are going stay out of Mommy's way for a while.”