The Long and Winding Road (The Seafare Chronicles 4)

“You tried,” Anna says. “I suppose it’s the thought that counts.”

I picked up what remained of the box the pump came in and put it back inside. “We will still send a thank-you note to Helen, even though she’s a homophobic asshole. Izzie, don’t say that word because it’s bad. I’m an adult, and therefore I can speak how I wish.”

“Are you sure about that?” she asks me without looking up.

“Which part?”

“Exactly.”

“Brat.”

She’s smiling, though, and it’s nice to see. She’s slowly been coming out of her shell, getting used to her place here with us. It probably helped that the visits so far from the social worker have gone so well, given that Otter and I are old hats at it. Erica Sharp was able to track down Izzie’s father, and he didn’t seem to give two shits about Izzie. Which was good in the end, because he was doing twenty years in Georgia for armed robbery. We’d thought the news would hurt Izzie, but she’d only sighed in relief and asked if that meant she was able to stay with us for good now. When I told her that looked like it’d be the case, she began to settle, talking to us more rather than just to Ty. It was obvious that she felt more comfortable around him, but she was giving Otter and me a chance. Last week, she’d even come to us and asked for something she’d seen online, some bug-hunting kit she’d found on Amazon. I’d been so taken aback that she’d actually asked for something that I hadn’t hesitated in handing her my credit card.

(“Wait, a bug-hunting what? Izzie, you better not let those things loose in the house, you hear me?”

“Bear’s scared of bugs.”

“You shut your mouth, Otter. I am not. I just don’t like them when they fly. Or crawl. Or come near me. Or are alive.”)

Erica thought we’d get to go before a judge to finalize guardianship sometime early in the new year, which we were all trying to stay cautiously optimistic about. Erica had pulled us aside and told us she thought it was a done deal, but we’d learned to be careful about such things. “This is a good thing, guys,” she’d told us. “You’ll see. I’m never wrong about situations like this.”

We already had everything we needed to get her registered for the new school year next month, something she wasn’t exactly thrilled about. Otter and I decided that we’d wait to talk to her about it more until August, but she knew it was coming, whether she wanted it to or not.

I think she let a couple of bugs into the house on purpose for that.

I was concerned for a little while that she’d feel we were shoving her aside with all this baby shit, or that she’d think she inconvenienced us by appearing when she did, especially with the twins on the way. When we sat her down to tell her that she wasn’t in the way, that we wanted her here, twins or no twins, she looked at us a little funny before saying that she knew that. “Don’t be stupid, Bear,” she’d said, rolling her eyes. “You’ve already done more for me than Mom ever did. I’m not worried about that.”

I’d never felt so bad and so good all at the same time. It was an odd feeling.

So we’re all right. Mostly. I’m still not happy about Ty’s living arrangement, but I don’t think Dom has smiled this much since I’ve known him, so they must be doing okay. I’d told Tyson that he absolutely cannot get married until he finishes college, and he’d given me such a look of horror that I immediately felt better about the entire situation.

Except now I have a breast pump in my lap, and I’m plotting ways to make a ninety-year-old bigot pay for her crimes.

My life is strange.

“Do you really need all this stuff?” Tyson asks, frowning at a giant

vat of some kind of cream he’d unwrapped. “Isn’t it a little overkill?”

Dom and Anna had matching eye rolls, like they couldn’t believe the childless people in the room could be so naïve. I forgot every now and then that Dom went through this exact same thing while we’d been in New Hampshire, and I felt guilty at the fact that we hadn’t been there for him like he was here now. There wasn’t much I could do about it, but it still doesn’t sit with me right.

“Trust me,” Anna says. “You’ll need all of this and more. Those hundreds of diapers you have stacked against the wall? That’ll probably last you a couple of months, if you’re lucky. Formula? Gone by Thanksgiving. Wipes? Probably will have to buy more by the time Halloween decorations go up.”

The Kid stares at her, aghast. “That’s such a racket.”

“Newborns cry, poop, eat, and sleep,” Izzie says. “And that’s it.”

“How do you know?” Ty asks.

“I read about it on the internet.”

“You’re researching newborns?” I ask, oddly touched.

She sighs and puts the book down in her lap. “There are going to be two of them,” she says. “And I’m going to be their aunt. Of course I’m researching newborns. I plan on being their favorite out of anyone, so I need to get a head start.”

“Aunt Izzie,” I say. “You know, I never really thought of that. Weird, right? You’re only thirteen years old, and you’re going to be an aunt.”

“I was a late mistake,” Izzie says. “It happens.”