Give & Take (Redbeard Cove #2)

23. Lana

Chapter 23

Lana

I t takes two full days, but on Sunday morning, I wake up thankfully feeling a little like myself again. Today, I’ve set everything Raph aside, grateful it’s a day I won’t have to see him. Instead I plan on being wholesome mom of the year. That will make things better.

By the time the girls meander down to the kitchen to the scent of pancakes and bacon, I’ve got the table set like Suzy Homemaker. I’m even wearing a frilly apron. With flowers on it.

“What’s wrong with you?” Nova asks.

“What do you mean?”

“You look crazy.”

“I’m smiling!”

“Exactly,” she says. “And you’re wearing that scary costume.”

I drop my smile, scowling now.

“There’s Mommy’s face!” Aurora says gleefully, throwing her arms around my waist .

I need to work on this.

“Can we go play on Gas-patch?” Aurora asks fifteen minutes later, after inhaling her third pancake.

Gas-patch is what we’ve dubbed the monstrous splash pad in the backyard. It started out as me complaining about the dead grass it’s going to leave enough times they started just referring to it as Grass Patch. But Aurora kept missing the ‘r’, and Raphael declared the name had to stay the way she says it because of how adorable it is.

Privately, I told Raph it sounds delightfully like ass-patch, which is the perfect name for someone who’d give something like that to the kids in place of keeping his promises.

“No comment,” was all Raphael had said, irritatingly not griping with me, but with a grin that said he at least agreed. I think.

I sigh, looking out at the inflatable island dominating the backyard. “Yes, you two can play. But first you’re talking to your father, remember?”

They both sag.

“Again?” Nova asks.

“Yes, again,” I say. “He wants to talk to you every Sunday now, remember?” This is a new thing that started after his visit. I suspect he feels threatened by Raph’s presence. But if a little touch of toxic masculinity is what it takes for him to be a better parent, I guess I should hand it a thank-you card.

“What about what we want?” Nova asks.

“Yeah!” Aurora agrees, looking longingly at Gas-patch .

I want badly to say, ‘your father’s not very good at considering what other people want.’ But instead I think of Raph’s “no comment” and take the high road. “Maybe we can talk to him about the schedule, too,” I say. “Come on, let’s tidy up before he calls.”

The girls moan, but with a little coaxing we get to work.

While I’m scraping scraps into the compost, I think about how Raph’s refusal to join in on my complaints about Mike irritated me at first. But I realize I’ve felt better about the way things are with my ex than I have in a long time. Maybe some of that is getting attention from Raph. But I think a bigger part is the influence of Raph’s personality. He doesn’t complain. Like, ever. He just lets things roll off his back and moves on. I honestly think he just doesn’t dedicate brain space to things that don’t suit him.

Maybe I can do that. Maybe I can think of Mike— deal with Mike—and be completely serene. And… kind?

Who even am I?

Except when I start the call twenty minutes later, my newfound resolve is instantly tested.

It’s not because Mike’s not there. It’s because he’s…done something to his face.

“You okay?” Mike asks, fingering the new little triangle of hair under his bottom lip.

I’m trying extremely hard to keep a straight face.

“Yup,” I say. I clear my throat. “That’s new, isn’t it?”

“This?” Mike asks, stroking the miniature goatee like he’s a D-list villain .

On a normal day, I’d roll my eyes at corporate, straight-laced Mike with a geometrical soul patch. But with the whole grass-patch ass-patch thing? It’s nearly too much.

“Remember I told you I started doing some work for Richard Boswell?” Mike asks.

Richard Boswell is this actor who moonlights as a spiritual guru, who I think also sells some kind of pyramid scheme skincare products.

“I didn’t?—”

Mike continues as if I haven’t said a word. “Well, you know, Riki tells his whole team to live authentically . I just figured it’s been a long time since I expressed myself through my body. You know?”

“Cool,” I say, even though this vibe is the absolute antithesis of cool. But I’m kind of amazed. Mike just fully interrupted me, which would have made me lose it a few weeks ago. Today? I feel nothing. Not even annoyed.

It’s a revelation.

It’s Raph, shrugging. The grass will grow back.

“Oh, Hi, Dad,” Nova said, coming back to the room with her sister after washing up.

Okay, now if the girls had seen that, I would have pointed out that interrupting is not okay. But this time I let it slide. My peace is valuable.

Aurora immediately squints and sticks her finger out, rubbing it back and forth on my laptop screen.

“Aurora, what are you doing?” I ask.

“There’s something there.”

“No,” Nova says wearily, “That’s just dad’s face.”

“You dig it?” Mike asks .

“Dig what?” Aurora asks. “A hole?”

I abruptly stand up, mumbling something about letting them chat.

Mike chuckles, doing a little drum-beat on his coffee table as I walk away. “Let me tell you about digging it,” he tells the kids.

I picture Mike playing bongo drums with his new buddy Riki and nearly cough-splatter the water I drank to avoid laughing out loud.

Mike is so far from the man I married.

But I hesitate on that thought as I head toward the deck to give them time.

Is he really that different than he was then? He was smart. Somewhat charming. A go-getter and full of compliments for me. He’s the same now, minus the compliments.

But I never felt that extreme chemistry people talked about even in the early days of our relationship. The chemistry I always thought was made up, until I met Raph.

Raphael LaForest makes me feel like the inside of a grilled cheese sandwich.

My mind reels once again as I step out onto the back deck, thinking about my moment yesterday morning. I have never never felt compelled to do something like that before. Ever.

With Raph, even the most innocent touch has my breath catching. He’ll rest his hands on my shoulders at the kitchen island when he comes in in the morning, telling a brand new joke to my kids and softly pressing his thumbs into my aching muscles, and I feel every nerve come alive. It’s like when he touches me, every cell bursts into being like it was created just that day.

I mean, maybe it was. I don’t know how cells work.

I pause in my pacing. Is this menopause? No, I’m too young. Perimenopause. That comes with these weird hormones, right?

I need to get a hold of myself. I start to pick up kid detritus on the back deck. Cups and crayons and abandoned toys. That’s sufficiently unexciting that my mind eventually calms down.

Twenty minutes later, the girls burst outside, already in their bathing suits.

“All done!” Nova says, like she’s endured a great hardship and needs a high five. I feel a little guilty—Mike’s her dad after all.

“You girls have sunscreen on?” I ask.

“Yes!” Aurora shouts, holding out her arms like I can see it. “Nova helped me an’ I helped her!”

Raph’s taught them how to help each other, leaving me with one less task I used to do off my hands.

As my littlest squirms out of my grasp I ask, “You’re not hungry? Thirsty?”

“Mom, hello!” Nova says, running for the slide. “We’re still stuffed from breakfast, obviously.” She sounds so much like the teenager she’ll be in a few years I can only smile at the little touch of sass.

”Okay, fine. You know where I am.”

As much as Gas-patch annoys me, I have to admit it’s been great for keeping the kids occupied. They haven’t gotten bored of it yet.

Before I retreat inside, I allow myself a glance up toward Raph’s suite. The last moment we had together was him thinking he’d done something bad by watching me pull on a t-shirt.

I want so badly to get a glimpse of him. It’s like I need a fix. It’s pathetic, really. If I could slap myself, I would.

But all I can see from here is a sliver of a window. He’s probably not even home.

I tell myself I’m a grown woman and not a lovesick schoolgirl.

Then I head back into the house and settle myself at the kitchen island.

I’ve only just opened my laptop when I hear Aurora crying.

“Mom!” she calls. “There’s something wrong with Gas-patch!”

I hate that my first thought isn’t a charitable one. It’s a groan at having to get up again, and the thought, Finally, I have an excuse to get rid of it.

When I come out, I can see there’s definitely something wrong. The far side of the small inflatable beast is folding in on itself.

“It’s leaking!” Nova says. She runs over in the direction of one of the turrets, which is now looking remarkably like a very sad car dealership floaty guy bent at the waist. Puking, maybe.

Past me would have very badly wanted to put Mike and his ass-patch back on the video chat just to say I told you this was a bad idea!

But any last bit of pettiness deflates just like the castle as I see Aurora’s face crumple into tears.

“Oh sweetie,” I say. “Hang on, I’ll see if I can figure out what the problem is.”

Except the moment I step off the deck onto the wet grass, I hear a strange noise.

It’s kind of a croaking sound. A rasp.

What is that?

The croaking grows louder. “ Mom !”

My stomach lurches. I think it’s Nova, saying my name in the strangest voice I’ve ever heard. Though, heard is a strong word. I can barely make out what she’s saying. I walk sideways, toward Aurora. Nova’s hidden from view.

“Nova? Everything okay?”

But the moment Nova comes into view, I freeze.

There are two terrible things I notice at once. The first is that the floppy turret is deflating in a strange way now. It’s jerking left and right.

The second, and the thing that has my full attention, is that Nova is frozen.

No, not quite frozen. Standing stock-still, but trembling, her fingers nearly a blur they’re shaking so hard as she points toward the thrashing current.

I catch a flash of copper as the turret snaps to attention again.

“Oh my God,” I whisper, my heart thundering as I realize what’s happening.

Redbeard Cove is an adorable small town in a picturesque location. Nestled between the sea and a wild mountain range so rugged, there are no roads through it to the rest of the country, only the one up the coast, which is why we’re only accessible by ferry .

But wild and rugged with no roads means no people. No people means animals prevail.

Big animals, like bears and cougars.

They don’t show up all that often, so it’s easy to become complacent. But every now and then there’s a sighting in someone’s backyard.

Like right now. Because right now, there’s a cougar in my backyard, with its claw apparently stuck in the side of the grass patch.

The next few seconds pass in what I can only describe as silent, torturous slow motion. Like someone’s turned the speed of the world down to 0.5.

I’m in between my two kids, stuck in an awful moment of needing to make a horrific decision.

Aurora’s closest to me at about ten feet away. At only three and a half feet tall, she’s at the most risk. Cougars tend to go for things they can drag away.

But Nova’s closest to the animal.

“Nova!” I say calmly, deciding to act based on who can follow instructions the quickest. “Pick something up. Get very big and make noise!”

Unlike with bears, the wisdom with a cougar is to make noise and try to scare it off. Act big.

Pick up small children.

Nova, given clear instruction, backs up, looking around.

My heart lodges hard in my esophagus.

I turn to my youngest, who’s only a few feet from the end of the deck, looking confused. I don’t think she can see the animal from where she’s standing.

“Aurora honey, get inside the house.” My voice belies a calmness I’ve pulled directly out of thin air. I want to run to her, but I can’t leave Nova.

“Why?” Aurora asks sweetly, quirking her head.

A growl emanates from the giant cat, and that’s the thing that has me lose all common sense.

“Get inside the house, right now !” I scream at the top of my lungs.

Then I race toward Nova, who’s shaking as she picks up an inflatable ball.

Just then I hear a sound overhead. The schlock of a window sliding open. “What’s going?—”

Then a big pause, and a booming “Hey!”

I have never—never—been so happy to hear Raphael’s voice. And that’s saying something, because besides my kids he’s the highlight of my life. I can say that now seeing as the lives of all three of us are flashing before my eyes.

Raphael leans out his window—the one that opens onto the backyard. He quickly assesses the situation. Aurora’s on the deck now, crying as she stands by the railing. She hasn’t gone inside, but she’s still in a better position than Nova.

Raph’s arms are rigid as he grips the windowsill, his eyes on the animal. “I’ve got the cat,” he says calmly to me.

I sprint forward, scooping Nova up in my arms.

I throw her onto one hip, vaguely register a boot sailing out of Raphael’s window. I turn to see it bounce hard off the cat’s shoulder.

The animal yowls.

Must. Get. Aurora.

“Something else!” I yell without looking, running toward my youngest with Nova bouncing on my hip. I barely notice how heavy she is. That is, until my foot catches on the hose connected to Gas-patch. Nova and I both scream as I fall. I turn at the last minute, Nova landing on me and knocking the wind out of me. “Run!” I wheeze from the ground. “Get Aurora! Go inside.”

Nova scrambles to her feet. “What about you?”

“Inside!” I say after a suck of breath. “I’ll be fine!”

For once, my contrarian daughter listens without hesitation, sprinting into the house.

A second boot flies out the window, hitting the cat again. I only know because of the cat’s cry—I can’t see it anymore from down here.

“Run!” Raphael yells. It’s unclear whether he’s talking to the cat or me.

Vaguely I hear the patio door slam shut. Good. They’re safe.

Pain screams from my wrist as I get myself up, but it’s gone in a new wash of adrenaline.

I stumble up the steps of the deck then sprint across it. I hit the patio door, then reach for the handle yanking it open.

But the door is locked.

“Nova!” I hiss, not wanting to yell.

“Lana?” Raph calls. He leans out the window again.

“I’m locked out!”

“What?”

“Nova. By accident. She locked me out.”

“Yes, it’s still there,” he says .

I realize belatedly he’s not talking to me. He’s on the phone. Animal control, I assume.

“Yeah, that’s what I’ve been doing,” Raph says, looking from where the cougar is to me. “I can’t…my uh, my girlfriend, she’s in danger.”

The cat looks at me, its eyes wild. I look at Raphael, my eyes just as wild, registering somewhere that he called me his girlfriend.

That I liked it.

But his eyes are even wilder.

The cat roars. Raphael doesn’t hesitate. “Here!” he calls. He tosses me the phone. And then Raphael LaForest jumps out his second story window.