Taylor Lynne: The Women of Merryton - Book Two (3 page)

I stroked her smooth hair
one more time. “All right, you’re all set.”

She went back to sit next
to her sister. I took up a kabob. Ashley followed suit and offered one to Emmy.
Emmy took one, but she only looked at it.

“Try it, silly,” Ashley
encouraged her.

She took a bite of the
banana with some chocolate on it. She seemed to like it, but came to the
strawberry and hesitated. I wasn’t surprised. Kids with texture issues
generally didn’t like strawberries. I got up, sliced a banana for her in a bowl,
and drizzled chocolate over it. I handed it to her. She looked relieved, and
maybe a little happy.

“You are such a softie,
Momma,” Ashley commented.

I hugged her tight to me.
“I guess that makes you a lucky kid.”

She laughed. It was one
of my most favorite sounds.

“Hey the girl in the
movie kind of looks like Ashley,” Emmy said after several silent minutes of watching
the movie.

She shocked both Ashley
and me by speaking. We both looked at her and grinned. She even smiled back. We
made some progress, but I wasn’t getting involved.

At eight o’clock Easton
called Ashley to check in on them. Ashley told him they were with me and all
was well. Well, it was all well until Easton decided it was a good idea to pick
Emmy up at my house. I figured Ashley would take her home when it was time.
Easton didn’t need to come over. I almost went to hide out in my room, but I
reminded myself I had to quit running. I had to set a good example for Ashley,
even if it meant facing the one person that hurt me more than anyone ever had. The
person that betrayed me and used me. I really needed to quit thinking about it.

A little after nine, and after
a rousing game of Sorry, Easton showed up in scrubs. For a tiny second, I
remembered the first time I ever saw him; he was wearing blue scrubs just like
tonight. I reminded myself to quit remembering and to quit thinking—basically I
needed a lobotomy.

Emmy was happy to see her
dad and greeted him with a hug.

He hugged her back as
tight as he could. “Your hair looks pretty.”

“Taylor did it for me.”

I didn’t want him to know
that.

He looked my way from the
front door. I stood near one of the square columns that framed the dining room
area.

“Thank you,” he mouthed.

I turned from him and
walked back to the family room to clean up from our fun evening. I made my
appearance, right? I didn’t have to play hostess to him. I surveyed the family
room and all the boxes that still needed to be unpacked and the pictures that
needed to be hung up. I suddenly felt exhausted. I picked up our dirty dishes and
made my way to the kitchen. I could still hear them all talking in the foyer. I
wasn’t sure why they were lingering, but since they were, I decided to do the
same in the kitchen. It needed to be cleaned anyway. I wiped down the counters
and started in on the dishes, despite being tired. I hated waking up to a dirty
kitchen, and I already felt like the house was in disarray.

As I filled the
dishwasher, an uninvited guest joined me.

“Taylor,” he said.

I took a deep breath
before I turned around. Why hadn’t he gone home already? “You’re still here.”

He smiled and I noticed
that his smile was a little different than I remembered. It looked like he had
perfectly capped teeth now.

“I wanted to say thank
you for taking care of the girls tonight.”

“Well, one of them is
mine.”

“I know, and you’ve done
an excellent job with her, she’s terrific.”

“Yes, she is.”

Insert a giant awkward
pause. What else was there to say? It was late and I was ready to call it a
day, but he stood there looking at me. And then to make it more awkward, we
spoke at the exact same moment. I started to say goodnight and he started to
say something. I didn’t hear what in the confusion of it all.

He grinned. “I’m sorry,
what were you going to say?”

“Oh, I was saying I’m
sure you want to get home.”

His grin faltered. “Yeah,
it’s been a long day.”

“Well, goodnight.” I
turned back around to finish the last of the dishes.

“Ashley said something
about some leftover pizza.”

I closed my eyes. Was he
for real? I was his ex-wife, not his or his daughter’s caretaker. I was only
here because of our daughter. I took another deep breath and turned around.

He looked maybe a tad
embarrassed. As he should. Seriously, the nerve of him.

“I mean, you wouldn’t
want me to eat fast food or anything, would you?” he asked.

“What you do is none of
my concern unless it involves Ashley.”

He wasn’t deterred by my
callousness. He walked toward me and took one of the stools that lined the
island. I watched him because I couldn’t believe his audacity. First, I helped
take care of his daughter and now he wanted me to take care of him, too? He had
always been confident and self-assured, but this … this was plain arrogant.

“Don’t you think me
eating correctly involves Ashley?” he asked with feigning innocence.

I leaned against the
island and more toward him. I had a feeling we would be arguing, again. “How do
you figure that, Easton?”

“Kids want their parents
to be healthy, right?”

“They also want their
father’s to visit them more than once every few years or so.”

You would have thought I
suckered punched him. I could see the pain in his now red face as he sat there
with a stunned look on his face.

As he took his time
trying to formulate a response or even an excuse for his absenteeism in our
daughter’s life, I took a moment to look him over and, unfortunately, he looked
good. I was kind of hoping he would have let himself go or he would have gotten
ugly or something. But no, he had to get all distinguished looking.

The hurt my words caused
got to me, and since it didn’t look like he could come up with anything to counter
my jibe, I went back to why it wasn’t my job to feed him or take care of him. “You
look pretty healthy to me.”

He took the out I handed
him. “Looks can be deceiving.”

“Are you experiencing
health issues?”

“No … not yet.”

I was so tired of this conversation
and him. I was going to feed him so he would leave. No, I was going to wrap it up
so he could take it with him. In a huff I grabbed a plastic container, went to
the refrigerator, and filled it up with slices of both cheese and veggie pizza,
sealed it up and set it on the island in front of him. “I hope you enjoy it.”

I swear I could see a
hint of amusement in his eyes at my apparent frustration with him, but he
seemed determined not to let my unkind feelings deter him. I turned around and
began rinsing off my dishes again.

He didn’t get the hint. “Wow,
this is great. I forgot how much I missed your cooking.”

I took several deep
breaths this time before I turned around. “That was to go.”

He kept on chewing, but I
could see the merriment in his eyes. He finally swallowed. “Can’t we at least
be friends, Taylor?”

“Honestly, I don’t know if
that’s possible.”

I woke up tired and sore.
I’d had a hard time falling asleep. My ex-husband was once again keeping me up.
The first couple months after we split up, I’d had a hard time sleeping. I
would lay there and cry as I looked across the bed at the empty space next to
me. I would foolishly wish that he would sweep in and tell me he loved me, it
was all a misunderstanding, and he couldn’t live without me. He never came and
he never asked me to come back, so I filed for divorce. Now, once again, I was
missing rest because of him. How did he expect us to be friends after
everything? There was way too much toxic water under that bridge. It’s like he
had conveniently forgotten that he broke the most sacred trust that there can
be between two people. Or that he neglected his daughter for fourteen years.
Sure, he sent a check every month and called her on a regular basis, but it
didn’t make up for missing out on his daughter’s life.

I stretched and reminded
myself to quit thinking about him. I slowly climbed out of bed and walked to
the master bathroom. I really did like this little house. The master bathroom
had a claw-foot tub and a beautiful wood vanity. I decided a bath would be a
good thing this morning. I soaked my tired muscles, shaved my legs, and
pampered myself a bit. After drying off I sat at the vanity and looked into the
large oval mirror. At forty-two, I was at the stage in my life where I looked
in the mirror every day and thought,
I’ll never look younger than I do right
now
.

I began to comb out my
medium length copper blonde hair. It was more copper now than blonde, but at
least there were no grays. All in all, I couldn’t really complain. My blue eyes
still looked bright, and living in the humid south had kept my skin smooth. I
bought lots of extra moisturizer now that I was living in the arid west. I was
also drinking more water. I had forgotten how dry it was here, but my hair kind
of loved the extra volume. It was nice not to deal with the humidity when
styling my hair. So I guess there was one good thing about living back here. I
didn’t know if good hair could tide me over for the next two years, but at
least it was something.

I was looking forward to
my Saturday with my daughter, even if we were only unpacking. The whole sharing
her with her dad thing was definitely going to take some getting used to. Maybe
it wouldn’t have been so hard if I thought he was worthy. I knew when we divorced
I would have to share her, but I was saddened that he so easily gave me full
custody. He didn’t even ask for a set schedule to see her. He never asked for
her for holidays. It was like she and I never really existed. The only times he
saw her were when he would come back to our alma mater in Birmingham for
conferences or specialized trainings. Well, except for once. When she was five,
I agreed to let her come and spend two weeks here with him and his new wife.
That lasted all of about two days. Ashley called me crying about how horrible
Kathryn was to her and that was that. I demanded Easton fly her back home
immediately.

Now I worried he was using
her for babysitting purposes. I worried that he didn’t love her and he wasn’t
being sincere about getting to know her. But I tried not to think about it,
because it would drive me crazy if I did. More crazy than I was for moving
here. I still couldn’t believe when I told Ashley about her dad’s offer that
she accepted it and wanted to come. She was a smart girl; she said she didn’t
want to regret it later in life. So here we were.

I let Ash sleep in while
I started in on unpacking and decorating the living room and dining room. They
were the first rooms that came into view when you entered the house, so I
figured I better get them in tip-top shape. As I unpacked, I reminisced as I
pulled out each book, framed picture, and photo album. With happiness I remembered
night upon night of reading to Ashley before she went to bed, or the day she
got her braces off, or the year she won the school spelling bee. I had at least
a million happy memories of her and of our life together. I also looked
longingly at the pictures of Grams and Harry. They were my saviors. They were
balm to my wounded soul.

They too were part of the
reason I was here. Grams said it was time for me to face the past, to put it to
rest, as she said. She hated Frank probably more than me, but she said she was
afraid of how it would affect me if he died and I never made peace with him. More
importantly, she felt I needed to reconcile my feelings for Easton. She and
Harry liked him, even loved him. They weren’t thrilled with how we started off by
eloping, but when we lived in Birmingham, they had become quite close to
Easton. They too had held out hope that we would work it out after I first left
him. They couldn’t believe he’d had an affair, but like I said, he never came
for me and never asked me to come back. Grams never said anything, but I always
got the feeling they thought I made a mistake leaving Easton.

Look at me, thinking of
that man again. Surely, as time wore on here, I would get better at not
thinking about him. One could only hope. I decided sleeping beauty needed to be
up. I couldn’t be trusted alone with my thoughts.

Unpacking was much more
fun with her. We had the living room and dining room knocked out by mid-afternoon.
I was quite pleased with the results. It was southern living charm meets the
west.

Before we started in on
Ashley’s room, we took a snack break and kicked up our feet for a moment. It
was then I found out my day with my daughter was not meant to be.

“So, Momma,” Ashley said
warily. “Dad plays in a city baseball league and he wants me to come watch him
play tonight.”

I sat up from my relaxed
position on the couch and looked at her sitting on the overstuffed chair.

She was smiling sweetly
at me. “So, would that be okay?”

My heart sunk even as I
pasted a smile on my face. “I suppose so.”

Her face brightened and she
gave me her devious grin. “Will you come with me?”

I didn’t even need to
think about the answer. “No.”

She was not to be
discouraged. “Please, Momma. I don’t know anyone here yet, and I don’t want to
be there with Emmy by myself.”

“Your dad will be there.”

“Yeah, but he’ll be on
the field playing. Please, Momma?”

“Don’t you think it would
look a little strange if I came to watch your dad play?”

“Oh Momma, lots of
divorced people still do things together. And besides, I think dad would like
it if you came.”

“What makes you think
that?”

She shrugged her
shoulders. “I don’t know. It’s just the way he looks at you and talks to you.”

“And what way is that?”

“It’s like he wants to
get to know you again.”

I made it a point to
never disparage or speak ill of Easton in front of Ashley. At times like these,
it was hard, but I bit my tongue and smiled at my girl.

She decided to up her
game. She came and snuggled with me on the couch. “Come on, Momma. You know
someday soon I’ll be off at college …”

That was her favorite new
line to get her way. It worked like a charm. “Fine, I’ll go with you.”

She hugged me tight and
kissed my cheek. “You’re the best Momma ever.” She ran away to get ready.

“Remember that,” I yelled
out to her.

Again, this hadn’t been in
the brochure of what to expect when you move back to the same town as your
ex-husband. My brochure read that contact would be minimal and kept only to events
like school related activities that involved your child. It said nothing about
dinners, picnics, baseball games, etc. I wanted my money back.

At 6:30 I found myself
driving over to Palmer Park with Ashley. She told her dad we were both coming
and would meet Emmy and him in the stands so that Emmy could sit with us. The
whole way over, I thought about faking an illness. I felt a little ill. I
wasn’t ready to be out among people here.

My nerves were on edge as
we pulled into the semi-crowded parking lot. It had been ages since I had been
to this park that was half park and half baseball fields. I knew Ashley
wouldn’t remember, but her dad and I used to bring her here when she was
little. She used to love to swing. I told myself not to think about it and
flipped down my mirrored visor to add some lip gloss to my full lips. I checked
my hair and called it good. Ashley did the same. She had been raised right. We
both did teeth checks for each other to make sure there was no coloring from
the stain on our lips before we exited the car.

It was weird; on the walk
to the field, I felt naked, like everyone was staring at me. I knew they
weren’t, but I hated feeling so vulnerable. At forty-two, I shouldn’t feel like
I was walking into a new school for the first time. We met up with Easton and
Emmy. Emmy was still wearing the braid from the previous night, but it looked
like it had been slept on. I wondered if I should have Ashley talk to her dad
about taking care of girls. At least she smiled at me. Her dad did, too.

“Ashley, Taylor,” he said
happily. He awkwardly gave Ashley a little squeeze. I guess he was trying. “Let
me introduce you to some people.”

What was I supposed to
say, no? I knew it was going to be uncomfortable and it was. He ended up
calling me Taylor, Ashley’s mom. I don’t know why he couldn’t or wouldn’t say
ex-wife. That’s what I was to him, ex-wife number one. Maybe he was embarrassed
because now he had two. As we sat in the bleachers, I really did feel like I
was on display. I wondered if these people even knew he had an older daughter
and a wife previous to Kathryn. I wondered if these people were friends with
Kathryn, because they seemed to know Emmy.

In an effort to hide my
discomfort I decided I needed to do something. “Emmy, do you want me to fix
your hair?” She was sitting between Ashley and me. She nodded her head in
agreement so I had her sit in the empty space in front of me for a moment. I
undid the braid and combed out her hair. I noticed it should probably be
washed, but I didn’t say anything to her. I threw her hair up in a cute
ponytail and called it good. She smiled sweetly at me when I was through. I
couldn’t help it, I naturally put my arm around her and gave her a little
squeeze. So much for not getting involved with her.

Ashley looked at me and
gave me a knowing grin. “Momma, I’m going to take Emmy to get some snacks and
something to drink. And yes, they will be bad for us.”

I rolled my eyes at her
and she laughed. She took her sister and my money and left me alone to feel
more awkward.

I wasn’t alone for long.
One of my favorite people showed up with a large crew. I recognized her
husband, Blake, and her stepdaughter, Maddie, from their most recent Christmas
card and social media. I was so happy my friend realized her dream of having a
child in her home, even if the circumstances hadn’t been ideal. From the looks
of it though, you would have never guessed that Jessie wasn’t Maddie’s mom.
Jessie had her arm around her as they said goodbye to Blake. I had to smile as
I noticed the grimace on Maddie’s face as Blake kissed Jessie before he
departed for the field. On the other hand, I noticed how Jessie glowed.

The others in their group
looked familiar, but I couldn’t place names with faces. It had been a long time
and I had done my best to forget about this godforsaken place. Jessie was the
only person besides Easton I had kept in contact with. And Easton only because
I had to.

Jessie looked up and
noticed me. “Taylor, I didn’t know you were here yet.”

I stood up, met her in
the aisle, and embraced her. “It’s so good to see you. You look amazing.”

She looked me over. “Look
who’s talking. You make forties look like twenties.”

I waved her off.

She smiled and pulled
Maddie near. “Let me introduce you to our daughter, Maddie.”

I loved how her eyes lit
up when she said “our daughter.”

“It’s nice to meet you in
person. Jessie brags about you all the time.”

Jessie pulled her closer
to her. “We got her report card in the mail today and she made the honor roll again.”

“Congratulations.”

“Thank you,” she replied
before she scooted off to sit by a handsome boy.

I watched Jessie follow
her every move. “Blake is not going to be happy about that,” she said almost to
herself.

“Boys,” I sighed.

“You sound like you know
a thing or two about that.”

“Just wait, my friend.”

“I’m so glad your home,
Taylor.”

“Not home, just
visiting.”

She grinned
mischievously.

“What?”

“Oh, nothing. Let me
introduce you to everyone.”

We turned and made our
way back into the bleachers. There sat the two women that she walked up with.
First off I noticed the gorgeous blonde with a t-shirt that read, “Official
Baseball Butt Inspector.” I had to smile. I would never wear such a shirt, but
I liked her style. They all looked younger than me, like Jessie. It made me
feel old.

“Taylor, this is Cheyenne
and Abby. Ladies, this is Taylor Cole.”