For Lucy

“Dad, you can’t avoid her forever. It’s been years. She’s moved on. You’ve moved on. Things are good. Right? I mean …” Her expression deflates into a sad state. “Life’s not perfect, but it’s good. Considering …” As she trails off into dangerous territory, I lean forward and rest my hand on hers.

“If your mom is good with me coming inside, then I’ll come inside to wait.”

Her sad eyes shift, staring at our hands for a few breaths before her gaze lifts to meet mine. “A few days ago, she was going through some old shoeboxes in her closet. There were pictures of you and her. Before you were married. Before me.”

The thick scars on my heart stretch, sending a dull ache across my chest. “Oh yeah? I’m sure you got a kick out of her big hair and my obsession with flannel and huge belt buckles.”

Lucy giggles, a perfect salve for what ails my crippled heart. In so many ways, her giggle sounds the same as it did when I used to toss her in the air, stealing her breath for two seconds before I’d catch her. She’d explode into giggles as Tatum smiled in adoration at her little girl, showing complete trust in me.

I lost her trust.

I lost her.

I almost lost Lucy.

I’m pretty sure that would have killed me.

It only takes one good reason to keep going. To live. To feel necessary.

Lucy is my one. I just can’t let her see that. It would kill her to know she is my entire reason for waking every morning. I endure the other one hundred and fifty-eight hours in a week just to have ten with her.

“What were we doing in the pictures?” I ask.

“Everything. She had photos from the Grand Canyon. You were pretending to fall over the edge. Mount Rushmore pictures from the Fourth of July. Pictures of you two skiing in Tahoe. Combing the beach for shells in South Carolina. Just … everything. I had no idea you guys traveled so much before you got married.” She offers a polite smile to the waitress and nods when asked if she’s done with her plate.

I see so much of Tatum in her. It’s equal parts torment and salvation.

“What?” Lucy eyes me as she adjusts her ponytail.

“Nothing. I guess I didn’t realize we hadn’t shared that part of our past with you. We loved traveling. We basically lived to travel for eight crazy and amazing months—in an RV. And we towed your mom’s car behind it. It was so impulsive. And I regret nothing.”

My daughter’s brown eyes fill with excitement and wonder. I like this version of Lucy. I live to see this version of her. “Mom said the same thing. She said it was reckless.” She grins. “Then she got this look on her face. I think it was a smile. And she said those exact words. I regret nothing.”

Reckless.

I wonder what exactly Tatum was referring to? We were reckless in so many ways. The ones that stick in my mind involve her giving me head while I sped down highways and interstates at seventy miles per hour. Or sex in public restrooms while people occupied stalls beside ours. Something tells me she didn’t share that information with our seventeen-year-old daughter.

“We sometimes drove too fast and didn’t tip well at restaurants. So … you should learn from our mistakes.” No way am I telling her we had way too much unprotected sex. Nor am I telling her we dabbled in shoplifting stupid things like packs of gum and other cheap items just to say we lived on the edge—as if anyone was going to serve hard time for pocketing a pack of Big Red. I can’t give her ammunition to make excuses for any questionable behavior she might have in the future.

God, I hope she behaves. I won’t be able to handle having a rebellious teenager that I only get to see one day a week. Our time together is supposed to be fun, not a day of parental lecturing. Tatum has her for those other one hundred and fifty-eight hours every week. She can be the bad cop.

“Mom said you did more than drive a little too fast.”

My cheek twitches, fighting the knowing grin that wants to form on my face along with the rush of warmth in my chest from the thought of Tatum reminiscing with Lucy about the love story we shared … the one with an end neither one of us could have ever imagined.

But the beginning of our story … it was The. Best.

Chapter Two

THEN

My older brother, Will, married his first sexual conquest. A sticky situation that involved his seventeen-year-old girlfriend and unprotected sex. Worth mentioning … his girlfriend happened to be his boss’s daughter.

Will was nineteen.

He had two choices: marriage and job security or unemployment and castration.