“Lots of tiny butts to keep rash free,” I tell him with an easy smile.
I’m so grateful for this man. I know he probably doesn’t want to be stuck running errands with me, but he was quick to agree when I texted to ask if he could drive me.
I want to mention the interaction I had with Harley this morning and how he was almost civil, but I haven’t found the right opening just yet.
“And what size diapers?” he asks.
“All of them.” I look down at my list and read to him the size and counts Misty requested before she sent me out this morning.
He grabs the right sizes, nearly filling up the cart.
“That’s got to be two hundred dollars in diapers. Babies are freaking expensive.”
“They sure are,” I agree. “Do you want children?”
He takes a deep breath, watching me as if his answer is dependent on how he thinks I’ll respond to it.
“Does it make me a horrible person if I say I never want kids?”
I shake my head. “I don’t think that. I’m sure you got enough of kids growing up.”
“It’s not that really, but it’s impossible to always keep them safe. I don’t think I could handle a kid of mine getting hurt. The guilt would eat me up.”
“That’s part of the reason I had to get away from my mom,” I confess. “I wasn’t even living at home, but she blamed herself when I was taken.”
“And your dad?” he asks, his back to me as he reaches for the last pack of diapers.
It’s as if we’re carrying on a normal conversation, not one that makes my heart rate spike, and my palms grow sweaty.
“Dad never really cared about anything but work, and since money couldn’t fix the situation, he just didn’t talk about it. He just went to work earlier and came home later. Mom was the one hovering around and smothering me.”
I start to feel a little guilty for leaving my mom back in Nebraska. If she really felt the way Boomer is talking about, then it was a shitty thing to do to leave her because of it. I have no idea how I’d respond as a parent being in that situation, and I’m now finding it rather insensitive to behave the way I did.
“Don’t get lost in that pretty head of yours,” Boomer says after dropping two more packs of diapers into the shopping cart.
“I’m not,” I lie.
“You are. Now, come on. They have a coffee shop here, and I want a latte.”
Boomer pushes the cart as we walk toward the front, and it gives me the opportunity to look more around the store. I avoid people when they get too close and he eventually positions the cart so he’s between me and everyone else. He doesn’t sigh or grow frustrated. It’s as if the action is instinctual.
“It’s busy in here,” I murmur as we wait for a woman chasing after a toddler to move out of the aisle.
“I’ve got you,” he says, reaching out a hand and clasping mine.
“Sorry,” the woman whispers as she scoops the squealing baby up, tickling his tummy and telling him to stop running away.
I like the feel of his skin against mine. I can tell he’s doing it to be helpful, a way to assure me that everything is fine. There isn’t a flirty edge to it, and I have an idea that Boomer was revealing quite a lot when he told me yesterday that I wasn’t his type.
I want to lean my head on his shoulder, although that would pretty much mean he’d have to be on his knees, considering our height difference. It’s been so long since I’ve had any real form of human connection, and I know that’s my fault. I isolated myself from friends at school, giving excuses about going out and eventually ignoring them altogether when those excuses stopped being enough.
I haven’t had a boyfriend in over a year, and maybe that’s a good thing. I don’t think any relationship built on college parties and mediocre sex would survive what I went through. The connections I built at school seemed like they would last a lifetime, but they couldn’t even manage a few months of silence without withering and dying.
“I’d like a caramel frappé,” I hear Boomer say when I zone back into my surroundings. “Ali?”
“Umm.” I look up at the menu. “I think I’ll have the same. The biggest one you have, please.”
Boomer pays, waving away my cash when I pull it from my purse.
“Couch isn’t that comfortable, is it?”
I give him a weak smile. “It’s fine.”
“You should really take my bed,” Boomer offers once again, a repeat of the conversation we had last night after getting back to the clubhouse.
“I’m not putting you on the couch.”
“I was a Marine, silly girl. I can handle a couch. You should be on a soft mattress covered in silky down blankets.”