“You have this single-dad thing down.”
“It’s all an act,” I tell her as we make our way out to my truck. “It’s more of a ‘fake it until you make it’ kind of situation.”
“I don’t see that at all.”
“No? I’m a better actor than I thought.”
“Stop.”
I load Milo into the truck and pull the blanket back from over his head, his eyes are already getting droopy. My boy can’t resist a ride, puts him to sleep every time. “Really,” I say once I’m behind the wheel of my truck. “I’m constantly worrying if I’m doing enough, taking good enough care of him. I don’t want to mess him up, you know?”
“First of all, that’s absurd. Do you love him?”
“Of course I do. What kind of question is that?”
“Sorry, it wasn’t meant to sound bad. What I mean is that you love him. It shows through with everything that you do. The way you hold him, the way you talk to him, the way you take care of him. No one is perfect, Colton. But at the end of the day, if you’ve done your best and you can say without a shadow of a doubt that he knows you love him, I’d say, you, sir, will have passed with flying colors as a father.” My chest inflates from her praise. I’m learning as I go, going at this mostly on my own, and it’s nice to know that someone outside my family can see that I’m trying and that I love my son with everything in me.
“I hope you’re right. It’s not just being a single father, but it’s molding back into civilian life. I graduated and enlisted. That’s been my life. Short visits home, then back into the barracks, or the field. I feel so… out of place. That’s really the best way that I can explain it.”
“I can imagine that would be hard for you.”
I nod. “Yeah, my brothers, those not by blood, but by duty, they were my closest allies. They’re all still enlisted, fighting and standing tall without me. Sorry, I don’t mean to drop all of this on you.”
“You have to talk to someone. It might as well be a stranger.”
“I’d hardly call us strangers.” She’s consumed my life for the last week that she feels like anything but a stranger to me at this point.
“We’re more strangers than friends, maybe acquaintances.”
Glancing over, I see she’s staring out the passenger-side window. She looks sad, lost in her own thoughts. I reach over and place my hand on her arm, returning my eyes back to the road. “We should fix that.” Sure, it’s selfish of me to offer an olive branch of friendship, but something tells me she needs it just as much, if not more than I do.
She glances over and offers me a shy smile. “Yeah. I think I’d like that,” she agrees as we pull into my parents’ driveway. “I’ll help,” she says once the truck is parked. She climbs out and opens the back door, reaching in to grab the diaper bag.
I make sure the blanket is tucked in close around Milo as he slumbers in his seat, and we head inside. I don’t bother knocking. I grew up here, and Mom would give me all kinds of hell for knocking. She and Dad have always made sure we know that this is our home, no matter how old we are. I want Milo to have that same reassurance.
“There’s my nephew,” Chase greets, reaching for the car seat and taking off toward the living room.
“He seems really attached to him. That’s great that he’s so involved.”
“Yeah, but there’s a story there.”
“Oh, I’d love to hear more of it sometime.”
I nod. “I’ll give you all the gory details. Actually, it’s pretty cut and dried, but I don’t want to get into it right now.”
“I didn’t mean to pry.”
“You didn’t. However, my mom and Gabby are about two point five seconds from stealing you away from me. We can talk later?”
“Hollis. It’s good to see you,” Gabby says, walking into the foyer. She leans in and hugs Hollis, and then me. “Come on.” She grabs Hollis’s hand. “I’ll introduce you to Connie and Wes.”
“He’s snoozing,” Chase says when I join him and Dad in the living room. He has Milo resting on his chest with his blanket snuggled around him.
“He took a pretty good nap earlier this afternoon, so he shouldn’t sleep long. In fact, don’t let him, that way he will sleep tonight.”
“Is he still sleeping all night?”
“For the most part. There’s a night here or there that he’ll wake up hungry. I give him a bottle, and then he goes right back to sleep.”
“You’re welcome.” Chase gives me a cheesy grin.
“Thank you, Chase.” He’s kidding, but I’ve never been more serious. I don’t know what I would have done if Chase and Gabby had not looked after my son when they did.