Lily Love (13 page)

Ruh-roh.

“
Hey, Max,” I say with canned excitement. He ignores me to close and bolt the front door. I watch in fascination and envy as he shifts his duffel bag on his shoulder, grabs Lily’s hand, and balances two steaming boxes of Joey’s Pizza in the other. Grace like his is the seventh world wonder to those of us lacking it.

“Sweet Caroline,” he drawls out with sarcasm. I shift nervously on balls of my feet. He regards me with a mixture of amusement and annoyance. I swallow hard and aim for a convincing smile.

“Neil Diamond?” I force a laugh. Clearly I didn’t think my plan through very well, and now the consequence is walking toward me, scowling.

“Don’t you Neil Diamond me.” He shakes his head, exasperated. “You’re fired.” He brushes past me on his way to the kitchen with Lily in tow.

I trail behind them, caught in the aromatic wake of garlic and oregano. My stomach starts to sing the hallelujah chorus.

“Max,” I start.

“Uh-uh,” he cuts me off. “You were going to call when you were released. Why didn’t you call me?” He slides the pizza boxes onto the counter and drops his bag on the floor. I open my mouth to reply, but nothing comes out. I’m struck dumb. Max doesn’t wait for me to formulate my excuse.

“Lily Love, why don’t you show me where your jammies are?” He squats in front of her, swaddling her where the towel’s come loose. “You’re going to catch a cold, Ms. Thang.”

“Ah! Ah! Ah!” she bellows and is off again, running through the house like a bat out of hell. I prefer Lily’s hand flaps to her loud chanting. It’s just another way she expresses her excitement, but I miss her broken sentences. After all, Lily didn’t speak clearly until she was four and a half. I waited a long time to hear her thoughts out loud.

Max follows the pink blur up the stairs without looking back. It makes my heart sink to know he’s upset with me.

“Max,” I call after him, and when he stops to look over his shoulder, I’m met with wariness. “I’m sorry. It was thoughtless and inconsiderate. I’m a jerk.” With a small smile, he nods and continues after Lily. His lack of response hurts just as much as if he’d called me a jerk himself. I’m blessed every day to have a friend like Max, and I’m a fool for being callous with his feelings.

Way to go, Caroline.

I take Max’s bag to the guest room and grab paper plates from the pantry. It’s not enough to calm my nerves. I wipe invisible spots off the refrigerator door, wash my hands, pace around the island, anything to keep my mind occupied and off my stupidity.

Push. Push. Push
. I’m a pusher. Well, not really a pusher, more like an enabler of emotional warfare. I test people, poking and nudging them until they’re at a comfortable distance, and then lament my own loneliness. Who would actually subject themselves to that kind of mind-fuckery? Oh, that’s right. Me.

“Mama! Mama!” Lily chants, as her feet pound mercilessly down the stairs. “Pizza!”

I busy myself with trying to cut Lily’s slice in half with my good hand. Max follows Lily into the kitchen, but I continue my hack job on the helpless pie. I can’t look at him. I’m terrified that I’ve ruined his lovely gesture. No one has ever been so generous with their time except Paige, but she’s biologically obligated to.

“Can I help?” I jump at the sound of Max’s voice. My knife hits the countertop, spraying red sauce across the backsplash. “Chill your antics, Lizzie Borden.” He chuckles and takes the knife and the massacred pizza from me. “In half or in pieces?” My mouth opens and closes, but I remain soundless. “Lily, half or pieces?” he asks her, as he shakes his head at me.

“I’ma eat it all.” She nods confidently. “I like pizza. Mama messy.” That shakes me out of my trance. Eat it all and then throw it all up, maybe. Baby girl doesn’t have the gift of self-regulation.

Apparently Mama doesn’t have the gift of neatness. I look like a crime scene. Sauce has splattered like blood across the front of my shirt, all the way into my hair.

“Half, please,” I manage. “Otherwise, she shovels too much, too fast and makes herself sick.” I lift the lid on the second box, and my eyes fill with tears immediately. “You must not be unforgivably pissed; you brought me taco pizza.”

I sniff. I love taco pizza, but Peter and Lily hate it, so I never get it. For all the random things Max and I have talked about, I never would’ve guessed he’d remember my favorite pizza. My heart swells against my ribs, filling me with something I haven’t felt in a long time. I feel known.

“Not unforgivably pissed,” he murmurs, as he carefully arranges Lily’s plate. When he deems his masterpiece acceptable, he brushes his hands across the front of his jeans and shoots me a warm smile that sets my heart at ease.

“Wow, if get Joey’s taco pizza when I’m difficult, I wonder what you would’ve brought me if I’d been more acquiescent.” I force a laugh and take Lily’s plate from Max and set it in front of her. I feel woefully undeserving of the care Max has taken. It falls so far outside my comfort zone, I don’t know how to react. I would’ve thought by now he’d have grown tired of my defiance.

“Joey’s taco pizza,” he replies.

“What?” Surprise raises my voice to a pitchy squeak.

“Ever the Same—sung by Rob Thomas,” he sighs. “Good, bad, ornery, or acquiescent. You’ll get your favorite—taco pizza. It’s not contingent on anything.”

“Why?” I ask. “Why bother? I’m such a pain in the ass.”

“Yes, you are.” I meet Max’s barks of laughter with my evil eye. “You are a challenging woman, Caroline, but you’re worth it.”

If it were a physical possibility, my heart would burst free from my chest, roll across the kitchen floor, and pause at Max’s feet. The air in my lungs catches on the swell of emotion building in my throat, leaving me speechless. Max lifts his head from the pizza box when I don’t answer. How do I explain? What can I possibly say that won’t make me sound as pathetic as I feel? All I can think is how different things might be if Peter hadn’t stopped feeling that way about me.

“Caroline.” Max’s warm hands cradle my face before I can blink the first wave of tears back. “Why don’t you see what I see? How can you doubt yourself so much?” He rubs the pads of his thumbs through the wet tracks of my tears. My body shudders as I sob. Gently, Max cradles me against his chest, tucking me beneath his chin. In the sanctity of his embrace, I weep for the place in my soul that wanted to be enough for Peter to fight for.

“I wasn’t worth it to Peter,” I cry. “Why wasn’t I worth it to him?”

“He’s a fool,” Max says. “He lost sight of what was important.” My shoulders shake against his chest as his words pour over me. “You are a gift, Caroline, and Peter is an idiot for forgetting that.”

“We both did,” I whimper. “I lost sight of everything. I only saw Lily, and ended up chasing him away.”

“We all bear fault at the end of a relationship. Everyone makes mistakes, but you only want to look at what
you
did wrong.”

I roll my eyes at Max’s declaration. His body stills, like he can sense my rejection. I peel my face from the warmth of his chest and peek at him through my wet lashes. Sea-glass eyes bore into my soul, permeating the walls of my defenses, stripping my pain bare. I shiver from being naked and vulnerable in his relentless stare.

“It’s what you are, Carolina. You’re a gift to all the people around you. When you walk into a room, you bring warmth right along with you. When you smile, it lights people up from the inside out. You’re sunshine. Absolutely magnificent, and it breaks my heart that you can’t see that in yourself.”

Pain is such a personal thing. I wear mine like a cloak of protection, keeping people at bay. Max just casually removes it from my shoulders and drops it to the ground. If that weren’t intimidating enough, he lays it out like a picnic blanket, waiting for me to have a seat and join him.

“I haven’t been very sunny lately.” I laugh weakly. Resting my head against his chest, I save myself from his gaze. “I’m scared, Max. If I start to believe that I’m all you say I am, it will destroy me when I end up with no one to share myself with. No one’s going to want to take on a divorcée with a disabled child. Who would ever love me?”

My cheek bounces softly against Max’s chest as his laughter reverberates through me. I push off him, freeing myself from his orbital pull. I shoot him the stink-eye.

“Sweet Caroline.” He chuckles. “You say ‘love’ like it’s a choice. You just need to decide whether there’s someone out there worth loving back.”

“How do you have so much faith in me, Max?” I stare at him in awe.

“I told you, ‘Caroline I See You.’ ” In one fluid movement, Max closes the distance between us and pecks me on the forehead. He takes the plate I’ve been clutching and fills it with pizza like it’s the most natural thing in the world.

We sit on either side of Lily, listening to her endless chatter. Every once in a while I meet Max’s eyes across the top of Lily’s head. I have no idea what I did to deserve such a beautiful soul as this friend.

We eat every slice of taco pizza, and I listen while Max regales me with his latest musical finds. His eyes light up with a kind of passion I envy. I used to get that feeling when a great manuscript would come across my desk. I miss it; I miss that fire. When we’re done, Lily escorts Max to the couch to snuggle in for
The Good Night Show
.

“Hey.” I turn my head toward the whispered hush of Max’s voice. He’s cradling a sleeping Lily in his arms. “I’m going to go put her down. Is there anything I should do first?” I shake my head no and lead him up the stairs to Lily’s room. I watch him tenderly place my baby girl in her bed and tuck the covers in around her.

“Thank you for being here, Max.” I sigh. The weight of the day pulls heavily on my eyelids, and I try my best to stifle a yawn as we head back downstairs.

“You’re welcome.” He smiles at me. “Come sit with me for a bit,” he encourages as he guides us to the living room. I let him direct me to the couch, too tired to argue. “When was the last time you plopped on this couch and just vegged out?”

“Hmm . . . Too long to remember.” He grabs the remote and turns on
Talk Soup
. My eyes begin to drift during the reality TV clips, and my mind wanders to Tate. I’m consumed by the giddy warmth of his dimpled smile when I feel the world fall out from underneath me. My eyes shoot open to find Max lowering me onto my bed.

“Oh good, you woke up,” he quips. “I thought you were out cold there for a minute. You might want to change your shirt. You’re still covered in sauce.” He chuckles.

I rub my eyes, fighting to get my bearings. I tuck a loose strand of hair behind my ear and feel the crusty remains of rogue pizza guts.

“Oh, gross,” I mutter. Just my luck, a hot guy carries me à la Scarlett O’Hara to my bedroom and I’m caked with food splatter. Max tips his chin at me at walks backward toward the door.

“I’ll let you get to it.” He pats the doorframe on his way out. “Good night, Caroline.”

“Good night, Max.” He pauses in the doorway and turns his head my way one last time.

“Tomorrow maybe you’ll tell me who Tate is.” He laughs as my face flames with embarrassment. “You sounded pretty fond of him in your sleep.” With that last little jab, he closes the door behind him.

Crap.

I peel my clothes off and run a steaming bath. I throw some lavender bath salts in for good measure. If I have to bathe like this to keep my cast dry, I might as well make it worth my while. Besides, what do I care if Max asks about Tate? It’s not a big deal, even if I was hoping to keep him to myself for a while.

My stranger
, I sigh.
I wonder how you are tonight.

friend like you

M
orning light dances across my face, making me blink in confusion. I haven’t risen after the sun since before Lily’s birth. She is a dawn chaser; no matter how early or late she falls asleep, she wakes between five thirty and six o’clock in the morning. When her muffled laughter drifts through the closed door, I bolt upright, wincing when I put pressure on my broken wrist. Ignoring the throb, I scramble out of bed and into the living room. The TV is playing
Sesame Street
, and wouldn’t you know it, Kermit the Frog is interviewing Big Bird. The couch is empty, so I continue to follow the sound of her giggles to the kitchen.

Max is leaning over the back of Lily’s chair, helping her cut up pancakes. Lily bounces in her seat, giddy with anticipation, and Max is smiling down at her like she’s hung the moon.

“Good morning.” I yawn. Max and Lily look up in unison. Max stands up straight, revealing the apron he’s tied on. The snort that erupts from me is far from ladylike, but I can’t help it. Staring back at me is the Dirty Santa gift that Paige gave me last Christmas. In fancy scroll lettering, “I Kiss Better Than I Cook” is displayed proudly across his chest.

“Nice apron.” I giggle.

Max levels his green eyes at me, and points an accusing finger. “Hey, it’s yours.” He shakes his head and looks down to assess his attire. He brushes his hands across the front as his deep, throaty laugh meets my ears.

I ignore the goose bumps insisting their way up my arms at the sight and sound of this beautiful man in my kitchen. I’ve been numb for so long, my attraction to him is surprising and scary. Max would never hurt me; I know this. I trust him implicitly, but I don’t trust myself. I’m fairly keen on screwing things up. The last thing I want to do is screw up our friendship.

“Paige gave that to me last year for Christmas.” I laugh. “She’s a brat.”

In these moments, I could kill Paige. Wrap my hands around her cute little neck and wring it. Damn her! I’m already awkward and flushed with long-dormant hormones. I’ll combust if I have to discuss kisses with Max.

“I don’t buy it.” Max shrugs his shoulders and continues to cut Lily’s pancakes into perfect bite-size pieces. I flatten my hand across the butterflies in my stomach. I can’t help it; watching him fuss over my daughter melts my heart.

“No, really, she did,” I try to say nonchalantly. “She’s always doing stuff like that to get a rise out of me.” With his hands still on Lily’s plate, Max’s eyes lift to mine. They’re dancing with mischief, sending the fluttering butterflies into a fury. A smile spreads across his face at my nonchalance fail.