He smiled up at me, his eyes warm over the top of his reading glasses. “Heya, Pigeon. How was work?”
I sighed, stepping into him to press a kiss to his forehead. “Terrible,” I said cheerily. “Luke Bennet showed up at the flower shop and made a mess.”
“Nothin’ new there.” He frowned, the effect wrinkling his forehead and echoing his days as a sergeant. His sergeant face was the kind that scared boys off and made men prepare for a long, painful set of push-ups.
I flopped down in an armchair with another sigh. “He’s working the counter and deliveries. Came back from California to help save the shop. Fat lot of good he’ll do. He’s such a train wreck. I wouldn’t put it past him to accidentally set the place on fire.”
At that, Dad smirked. “Well, I knew the boy was good-looking, but I didn’t think he was so handsome he could combust.”
“Oh no—it’d be from setting off Black Cats in a bucket or mixing something dangerous with the fertilizer.”
He made a noncommittal sound and turned to dab paint on the soldier in his hand. “Just keep your head down and ignore him.”
“That happens to be my specialty, but I’m a little out of practice after five years,” I huffed like a brat, and annoyed with myself, I changed the subject. “Did you eat dinner?”
“No, not yet. I’ve been snacking.” He nodded to a bag of trail mix on the corner of the table. “I didn’t realize how late it was. Nothing makes me lose time like assembling an army.”
I chuckled, hauling myself out of the chair. “Come on. Let’s get you fed.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said, leaning back in his wheelchair as I grabbed the handles.
He hated when I pushed his wheelchair but accepted my doting as the affection it was.
He’d lost his legs in Afghanistan, third tour, IED. And he was the lucky one, the only one in his unit to survive. We moved to New York just after that, into an apartment left to my mother by her mother. Four years later, Mom was gone. It’d been me and Dad ever since.
By the time they’d found her cancer, it had spread to her lymph nodes and bladder. Chemo slowed it down but couldn’t stop it. One year from her diagnosis, and she slipped away from us. Before she’d died, she’d made me get genetic testing—I always assumed to ease her mind, make it easier to let me go. The results were good, although she still put me on preventative birth control and helped me organize a plan for my doctors, including regular screenings to be insisted on, no matter my age.
I hadn’t been the only planner in the family.
Much of the last year of her life she had spent teaching me how to adult, preparing me for what would come next as best she could. By failing to prepare, you prepare to fail, she’d quote Benjamin Franklin with a smile. Grocery shopping. Managing bills. Budgeting. She showed me the best way to clean around a faucet and how to get out every imaginable stain from laundry. I learned how to help Dad when he needed it—though not through practice. He was so hell-bent on the idea that he didn’t need help, it inspired a level of independence not always seen in people who had lost so much freedom. Never had I heard him complain. Never had he asked me for help.
I was always there to offer it anyway. And on occasion, he even let me.
Like when it came to cooking. His recipe repertoire was limited to cereal, hot dogs, and chili, but Mom had left me recipes on recipes, all written in her hand and housed in a box my father had made her when I was a baby.
I pushed him up to his spot at the table, the space with the missing chair, and pressed a kiss to the top of his head.
“What do you think tonight? Betsy’s famous beef Stroganoff or Meatballs à la Betsy?”
“Stroganoff. I’ve been dying for that sauce for what feels like ages.”
I chuckled, heading over to the recipe box. My fingers lingered as I flipped through the cards, the corners curled and soft, some speckled with grease or sauce. I found the one I had been looking for and set it on the counter even though I knew every word by heart.
“What’d you bring home today?” he asked to the sound of crinkling paper as he picked up my flowers.
“Bells of Ireland, love-in-a-mist, Iceland poppies. Nimbus sweet peas. Ranunculus.”
“Those the big orange ones?”
“Mmhmm,” I hummed with a smile as I moved supplies from the fridge to the counter.
“These should photograph nicely.”
“I hope so. The color combination is going to get me a load of likes on Instagram. I’m so glad Mrs. Bennet lets me bring home the flowers bloomed too far to sell.”
“So am I,” he admitted. “There’s nothing so inspiring as to have such fresh beauty delivered daily. Makes the house feel alive.”
I smiled at him over my shoulder. “Our house looks like a crazy plant lady lives here.”
“Well, one does.” He smirked at me before sticking his nose in the flowers.
It wasn’t a lie. Our house was full of plants, every corner teeming with broad leaves. Pots of ivy hung above, the vines led across the ceiling by hooks. They were Mom’s, and I’d kept them alive all this time. I had a recurring nightmare that I came home one day and they were all dead, crisp and brown and withered.
“It’s genetic, I suppose. Can you imagine what your mother would think if she could see Matilda now?”
I glanced at the biggest of the ivy plants, which spilled out of its pot like a waterfall. A few years ago, it’d grown so heavy, I had to bolt the hook into a beam to keep it hanging.
“She’d probably tease me for living in a virtual jungle and tell me to get out my pruning shears.”
He chuckled. “You’d never do it.”
“Not in a million years would I trim that beast back. Let her be wild.”
“It’s good advice, Tess. You could stand for a little more wild in your life.”
“Hey, I can be wild,” I said, dumping the steak into the pan with a sizzle.
He made a teasing noise.
“What?” I asked as I grabbed the big pot and filled it with water for noodles.
“You’re about as wild as a goldfish.”
“I’ll have you know that wild goldfish can take over a river within a year. They are a force to be reckoned with.”
“I’m just saying, it wouldn’t kill you to go out every once in a while.”
“I go out,” I insisted. “Last week, Ivy and I went to dinner.”
“You were home by nine-thirty.”
I shrugged. “I’m just saying. I do things.”
“The same things.”
“I like when things are the same. Predictable. Is that so wrong?”
“No, I suppose not. We all crave the predictable. It’s just a little easy, that’s all. A little adventure wouldn’t kill you, you know.”
“Some adventure could. Like skydiving. Or shark diving.”
“A date wouldn’t.”
I sighed, smiling as I turned for the table while dinner simmered. “Maybe I’m happiest when you’re the only man in my life.”
He watched me pick up the flowers and move to the island. “Tess, if the only man in your life is an old one with no legs, you might need to reevaluate your priorities.”