“No, really. I’m fine. I need to sort shit out. And I haven’t seen my niece in two days. I have to go home and make sure things are…”

“Things are what?”

I was gonna say OK. But then I realize what that implies about Jason’s parenting skills. He’s an asshole. I hate his guts. But I’ve never seen him be anything but loving towards Olivia, so it’s not fair to give strangers the impression that he’s not taking care of her.

“Just cool. You know.”

“OK,” Sunday says, pulling away from school. I glance at Mateo as we drive by and he stares back, but what’s on his mind escapes me. Because he’s got his no-expression expression on.

Sunday talks about his day as we drive home. It’s not a long drive, and I do my best to look interested, but holy shit. I just fucked a teacher on a classroom desk. My shirt is wet with his fucking come. And Sunday is acting like we’ve been BFF’s for decades instead of hours.

“You can pull in the alley,” I tell him, once we get over to the intersection of Broadway and West. “I live at the very end.”

We have the only apartment with a back patio. It’s dark, and cool, and flanked by tall bushes that partially hide the 5 freeway twenty feet down an embankment. It’s almost like living next to a river with the sound and the wind of the cars whizzing by. I love the patio, and how we got lucky with this apartment, I have no idea. We have two parking spots. The garage and the space that leads up to our patio. There’s a nice tall wooden gate that gives us privacy from the alley, and the patio leads to a glass slider in the living room. It’s pretty much the only thing this apartment has going for it.

“So,” Sunday says, the car idling in the empty space in front of the patio. “I’ll be right here at seven-thirty.”

I stop thinking for a moment and just enjoy him. His broad shoulders, his handsome face, his nice smile. He’s hot, for sure. But I enjoy him for more than the way he looks. Lots of guys are handsome. Mateo, for instance, is fuck hot. But Sunday is… interested. In me, I think. Or maybe I’m just making it all up. But he seems interested.

“OK,” I say back. “Thank you.”

“Anytime, Daydreams.” And then he winks and grins the grin of a boy who likes a girl.

I close the door and smile at him as he backs out of the parking space and turns the car around, my insides fluttering in a totally different way than they did back at school with Mateo.

Have I ever felt this before? I ask myself.

Felt what?

Normal.

Chapter Ten

Inside the apartment Jason is sleeping on the couch and Olivia is in that little baby swing she loves. She’s wide awake with the remnants of milk on her lips, staring up at me with her big blues, content to listen to the news blaring from the TV.

“Hey, Olivia,” I whisper as I get her out and hold her close. “Missed you.”

“Miss me too?” Jason asks.

I turn and glare at him, but keep my mouth shut as I take Olivia to the kitchen, run the hot water, and then wipe her face with the washcloth he uses to bathe her. She coos at me and even though I really hate her father, I love her a lot. She looks like Jill’s baby photos. My sister might’ve been a loser, but she was beautiful and I hate her for leaving me, for leaving us, and for all the things she will miss because she was stupid.

“I’m sorry, OK?”

I say nothing. I have nothing to say.

That’s not true. I have an entire Wikipedia filled with things I want to say. Things I want to scream at the world. But it’s locked up tight and I’m sure as shit not letting it out in front of Jason.

Jason walks up behind me and takes Olivia out of my arms. She coos at him too. And why not? He’s her father. She loves him.

That hurts me for some reason.

Jason grabs my chin, but it’s not in a mean way. He turns my head to make me acknowledge him. “I’m sorry,” he repeats, looking for evidence of his fist on my face. I looked earlier and it’s hardly even a bruise. It’s mostly yellow and will probably fade in a day or two.

I look up at Jason and find some semblance of sincerity in those blue eyes of his. I should say sorry as well. That’s what people do during an apology. But I have nothing to be sorry for, so I’m not gonna say it.

“You can stay here as long as you want, Shan. But I could use some help with Olivia.”

I nod. “Sure.”

“I got a job at night. So if you could just watch her when I go out, I’d appreciate it.”

“OK.”

He holds Olivia out to me and I take her back, pressing her close to my chest in a hug I need more than she does. “She ate about an hour ago.”

“What kind of job did you get?”

“Nothing special.” He walks off down the hall to the bedroom he shares with the baby.

Jason is a chef at a hotel near Disneyland. He works breakfast and lunch shift now, so I assume he’s picked up another shift at another restaurant. In San Diego he was a hotshot at a locally famous restaurant on the beach in La Jolla. He was probably considered well-off down there. But I’ve heard him complain enough about the daycare bill for Olivia to know that’s not the case now. Kids are fucking expensive.

When we first moved here I thought it was so he could be near his family. But then he said we were never going to see them. So that sorta sucked. It might’ve been nice to add a few real grown-ups to my life.

I take the baby back to the living room and put her back in the swing.

“Can you do laundry tonight?” Jason asks, walking out from the hallway and grabbing his keys from the small table next to the kitchen. “She’s out of t-shirts.”

“Sure,” I say, glancing down at my own soiled t-shirt.

“Be back late,” he says. He leaves through the front door and walks by through the kitchen window as he makes his way to the alley where he’s parked.

I change my clothes and put on shorts and a tank top, then start the laundry. Olivia is asleep in her swing when I come back from loading the washer, and I grab my backpack and pull out the book we were issued in English class today. I try to do all my homework in class because I’m not a homework-at-home kind of girl. But my assignment for English is reading The Good Earth, and I sorta got hooked on it in class. That teacher makes us read aloud in class. Twelfth fucking grade and we’re reading aloud. I paid no attention to what they were reading and I’m about halfway done.

But this school, you know? It’s not the best. It’s definitely near the bottom as far as performance goes. And I think that teacher knows that most of those kids will never pick up a book outside of school and this is the only way to get them to read.

I think I can finish this book tonight and have that report written tomorrow in class, so English is a non-issue for the next couple weeks.

My phone buzzes in my backpack, so I reach over and look at the message.

Unknown number: I’m at your door.

I look up at the front door, but then a knock on the slider to my right makes me jump. Mateo is standing on the back patio.

“What the fuck?”

“Let me in,” he says. I can’t hear him so much as read his lips.

“No, get out of here.” I glance over at Olivia to make sure he didn’t wake her.