Birthday Girl

She spins around, and I don’t have any time to react before her knee jams right between my legs, sending me falling forward.

I growl, gasping as white-hot pain fires like bullets through my groin, thighs, and stomach. I squeeze my eyes shut, dropping to one knee and a cool sweat breaks out all over my body.

I faintly hear her voice in my ear. “I wouldn’t dance for you if you were worth a billion dollars and your dick tasted like a cherry Tootsie Pop,” she bites out. “Stay away from me and my sister. Forget she existed.”

Sickness coils through me, and it takes a while before I can breathe regularly again. By the time I’m able to rise, my legs shaky, Cam is gone.

And so is my hundred bucks.

“You don’t love her, do you?” Dutch asks.

I finish stacking the boxes in the garage, my fourth project in the past week to keep busy when I’m not at work.

Dutch sits on a lawn chair just outside, leaning forward, his elbows on his knees and watching me like I’m a bull in a China shop, about to break shit any second.

It’s been nine days now since I’ve seen my son or Jordan, and every day that passes feels like they’re getting farther away from me. Like he’s moved on and like I never existed to her.

Any hope I had is quickly depleting.

I’ve called, texted, and left messages for both of them, and the only lead I have is an address to write to Cole that I harassed his recruiter into getting for me. I mailed my first letter yesterday.

As for Jordan, the only assurance I’ve been able to get that she’s okay is from Dutch who heard from his wife who got it from Shel that Jordan is out of town visiting friends, and she’s fine.

Is she coming back?

I stopped calling after a few days, because she clearly doesn’t want to talk, and I’m trying to respect her wishes, but.... If she called right now, I’d go get her from anywhere she was and give her anything she wants. For the rest of my life she can have anything she wants.

“Pike, you can’t marry her,” Dutch states like he knows where my head is at. “You know that, right?”

I keep my back to him, rehanging discarded tools on the workbench and slowly clearing off the table.

Nine d

ays ago I would’ve agreed with him. I would’ve said he was right.

People will talk. They’re probably already talking. They’ll make it dirty and wrong, and her friends from high school will joke about her, and no one would take us seriously. All they would see is her age and how she moved from son to father, and it would be the talk of the town.

But now I’m not so sure. Who cares what they think? We’d get through it, and Jordan’s circle of friends is as small as mine. She won’t give a damn what strangers have to say about it.

We’d be fucking happy, and eventually people would move on.

She wanted me. She wanted to love me.

She was ready for us.

I shake my head, arguing, “She’s different.”

“No, she’s not,” Dutch retorts. “She’s young and full of hope. Like we used to be.”

I turn slowly and look at him. It’s not like him to stand against me.

But I listen as he goes on.

“Everything is new and fresh to her,” he says. “She’s excited about life, and she makes you remember what that felt like. Before we grew up and realized we weren’t going to be fighter pilots saving the world or kings of Wall Street riding around in stretched limos.” He laughs under his breath, sitting back in the chair. “Before there were bills to pay and responsibilities piling higher as the years went on.”

His eyes fall, and I can see everything I’m feeling on his face. He doesn’t hate his life, and he adores his wife and kids, but if we could go back and do at least one thing differently, I know we both would.

Here we sit, and we’re not sure what we have to look forward to anymore.