Tyler nearly groaned at the cussing. Closed his eyes. Bit his tongue. If he chastised him now, Seth would shut down, and he sensed his boy was on the verge of spilling the details because he was riled up and could never bite his tongue when his feathers were ruffled. It wasn’t as if the kid hadn’t heard all the colors of the foul language rainbow from him over the years. But it was funny how he’d always been able to stay so calm and stoic in the conference room at his old law firm, when parents were going for the proverbial jugular across the table about custody or the house or the dog or one time, who got to keep the goldfish, but when his kid was feisty, he felt his fuse get lit.
“What’d he say?”
“What do you care? You’re probably getting off on knowing you can take my iPad for a week when I get home, just to make my life a bigger hell.”
“You know all I’m gonna do is think the worst if you don’t talk to me. Start speakin’, son.”
Seth sighed. “I told him his momma was ugly and that’s why he’s ugly.”
“You what? What’s wrong with you?” Tyler ripped off his Stetson and slapped his thigh with it. “Why would you say something like that?”
“Because he said it to me, said my momma clearly thought I was so ugly when I was born I scared her away which is why she didn’t want me!” An angry sniffle came through the phone, and Tyler’s heart broke. It broke into a million pieces.
He cleared his throat, smacked his thigh again with his hat, tried to steady his voice. “Want me to come get you?” he said more gently. Because all he could imagine was his son hurting and him not being there to wrap him up.
“Naw. I just…I don’t know. I’m pissed,” Seth mumbled, the hurt within him leaking out through a crevice. “One minute we were joking around and the next I punched him.”
Tyler exhaled. Shook his head, started pacing. When he spoke again, his voice was gruff, soft. “Your momma left because of me,” he murmured softly. “Ain’t nothing you and Stevie could have done about it. Don’t you let that BS sink into your head and fester. There’s no way she didn’t love you.”
Lies. Lies he told his boys over and over again for their own good. Lies that felt toxic on his tongue. But he’d take the blame. He shouldered that blame every day. Easier to let his boys have someone to hate, than tell them the truth and break their hearts.
“Then why’d she leave?” Seth whispered through the phone. “I’ve seen the divorce papers. I know her name now. I saw that you got sole custody of us.” Seth had what? If he’d seen those, then it meant he’d found Tyler’s file cabinet keys and rifled through his personal files.
“You got no business going through my desk, Seth—”
“Why won’t you tell me? Why’d you refuse to give her custody?”
Is that what Seth thought? That he’d refused to share custody? He’d known the time was coming to tell his boys about Isabella, but he wasn’t ready. He didn’t know how. His tongue was legally tied on the matter. And right here, in a drive-in with a woman he was screwing under the radar and not on a date with, with his kid three hundred miles away at camp, wasn’t the time or place. He’d have to tell them something eventually. He just wasn’t sure his arms were a big enough safety net to catch them when they fell. They weren’t little tykes falling off their bikes anymore, where a Star Wars Band-Aid and Popsicle could dry their tears.
“I remember what she looked like, you know. And she wasn’t ugly,” Seth murmured, before the phone clattered to the desk and after another moment of shuffling, the camp counselor picked up the phone again.
A hay bale felt lodged in his throat. His son may as well have punched him. Seth remembered her? He’d been four when Izzy had left, and Stevie two. Did he remember the fighting? Did he remember how Isabella had stormed off and told Tyler how he could clean up shitty diapers for the rest of his life? That she was tired of trying to please everyone and make it work? Did Seth remember the car accident?
“Hi, Mister Dixon.” Mandy’s voice, chipper and cheerful as always.
“Tell Seth I’ll pick him up.” His voice was gruff.
After a remark like that, how could he not?
“Will do. Hey Seth, your dad says he’s gonna come get you. Can you go pack your things?”
“What? No!” came a defiant exclamation in the background. “I don’t wanna go home yet.”
Tyler exhaled and finally dared another glance at Heather when the truck door shut. She’d gotten out, too, and was coming around the hood, watching him with concern on her face, when a toddler, bumbling by with a parent walking them around during the movie, grabbed at her skirt. She squatted, her face lighting up in the brightest smile, and poked the kid’s belly while eliciting a laugh.
“It’s really no trouble, Mister Dixon. He can stay. But one more warning and he will have to leave.”
Conceding defeat, Tyler exhaled and rubbed his neck, turning away from Heather and said his goodbyes, then hung up. He hadn’t even gotten a chance to tell Seth he loved him. He tapped around on his phone to buy time and get his thoughts under control, tapped open his email and scrolled senselessly through it, tapped open his social media app which again, needed the password, so he x’d out of it. Tapped open Tractor Feed’s website and somehow ended up looking at shovels.
“Everything okay?” Heather said softly from behind, as the kids in the film screamed inside their glass observation ball.
He forced a tight smile. “Yeah.” But didn’t look back at her.
Two arms slid around his waist and Heather rested her chest and her cheek against his spine.
He wanted to sink into the comforting touch and pretend they were in this together, yet wanted to throw off her distracting touch and get his head on straight. Instead, he stood rigid, thumbing past various products and dumping three different types of shovels into his cart.
She didn’t let go of him, but leaned around him, pressing her face to his bicep as he chewed his cheek.