The Trouble With Falling

“Should we go get Eli now?” I ask him and he nods, grabbing my hand and pulling me over to the door.

We hurry down the stairs and over to the bakery doors. I’m surprised by how much Eli has already gotten done.

“Maybe you should change careers. You could be putting furniture together instead!”

Eli chuckles, dusting his hands off and standing to survey his work. He’s already got three of the fifteen chairs put together and one of the tables.

“I should buy a power drill,” I murmur and Eli laughs.

“I’ll lend you mine whenever you want,” he says, and I grin at him.

“The food is done, Uncle Eli,” Brennan says, and seeing those two together has something funny happening to my heart.

Eli picks Brennan up, listening intently as he tells him all about what we made and how we made it.

I lock up and follow the two upstairs to the apartment. The oven goes off right as we walk in the door and I hurry to take the bread out of the oven before it burns.

“It smells delicious,” Eli says as he sets Brennan down in a chair at my newly cleaned off kitchen table.

Eli helps me carry over the plates and we all sit down to dig in. We’re almost done eating when Eli’s phone goes off. He excuses himself and Brennan and I finish eating.

“That was Patrick. He’s feeling better and he’s out grabbing some Clorox wipes and food. He said he’ll swing by and pick you up in a few minutes.”

Brennan seems sad to have to leave, but I’d be lying if I said that I wasn’t excited to spend some time alone with Eli.

“Let’s get you some treats to take home,” I tell Brennan and he jumps out of his chair and heads over to look through all of the Tupperware containers.

I help him fill up his own Tupperware and we stuff it into his backpack just as someone knocks on the door. Eli answers it while I help Brennan into his jacket.

“Patrick!” Brennan shouts and I look up to see an attractive man standing next to Eli at the door.

He grins at the little boy, his blond hair briefly falling into his eyes, and if I didn’t know better, I would think that he was Brennan’s biological father. They certainly have the same coloring.

“This is Ms. Hartley,” Brennan says, and I wave slightly as Patrick straightens and smiles at me.

“Ah, the famous Hartley,” he says. “I’d come closer but on the chance that I’m still contagious…”

“Oh, yeah. I appreciate the distance,” I say with a laugh.

“Well, thanks for watching Brennan. I’m sure I’ll talk to you later,” Patrick says, nodding at Eli. “Hartley, it was nice to meet you!”

“You too!” I call as he bundles Brennan close to his side and they disappear down the stairs.

“Tables and chairs?” I ask Eli once they’re gone and he nods.

I follow him downstairs and we spend a few minutes in comfortable silence as I hand Eli parts and he drills them together. We’ve finished another chair when I finally break the silence.

“So, what do I need to know about your parents before they get here next week?”

“Just be yourself. I told them that we just started seeing each other, so it won’t be weird if you don’t know everything about me and my family.”

“Right, but what’s our story?”

“Our story?” he asks as he screws another chair together.

“Yeah, like what are we telling them. How long have we been together? When did we meet? How did you ask me out? Where was our first date?” I list off all of the questions that I know we’ll be asked next week.

“Oh, um, let’s say that we’ve been dating for three weeks. You’ve only been in town for a few weeks so it wouldn’t make sense to say much longer than that.”