Firefly Island Read Online Free

me under his chin and brooded because Nick had started to notice that other kids in day care got picked up by their mothers. Nick wanted his motherto pick him up. Nick didn’t have a mother. Not that anyone could see, anyway.
    â€œNick’s mother doesn’t ever get in touch?” I asked, trying to picture her. There were no photos of her in Daniel’s apartment. I suspected that was intentional. Daniel’s face revealed an obvious pain whenever Nick’s mom came up in conversation. “She doesn’t ask to see him?”
    A sigh deflated his chest beneath my cheek. “She didn’t want kids. She’s into her work.” The bitterness in his voice worried me, if I wasn’t worried enough already. I already knew that Nick’s mother worked for an oil company and traveled around the world. “Nick wasn’t planned,” he added.
    â€œ I wasn’t planned, either, but my mom didn’t just walk out on me,” I said, and then admonished myself for overstepping.
    â€œIt is what it is.” Daniel’s arm tightened around me in a way that made me feel good. I was reassured that I hadn’t said the wrong thing. I tried again to imagine Nick’s mom. I conjured an image of an executive. In my mind she was tall, svelte, with the face and body of a fashion model. Blond, probably, judging by Nick’s hair. He didn’t get that from his father.
    â€œIt’s just harder now that he’s asking, you know?” Daniel’s hand slid up and down my arm, raising a pleasant tingle on my skin. I felt an expectation in that caress, in Daniel’s words, in the absence of Nick’s mother. There was an empty space to be filled here, for both Daniel and Nick. But I’d met Daniel only two weeks ago. How could either of us possibly know whether I was the person to fill it?
    I wasn’t a very likely candidate. If I met Nick now, we might only be setting him up for disappointment. On the other hand, if I didn’t meet Nick, how would I continue to spend time with Daniel? With no relatives living nearby, Daniel was a full-time single dad. The last two weeks had been an anomaly.
    Real life was headed this way, safely strapped in a car seat in the back of the grandparents’ minivan.
    â€œI don’t usually let him . . . meet people,” Daniel offered, and I felt sick. He was having second thoughts, trying to gently tell me that we needed to cool it for a while. Maybe now that Nick was coming back, Daniel was rethinking things altogether. Now that there was a child involved, perhaps Daniel was sensing the thing that men seemed to pick up on innately: I was hopelessly nondomestic. I couldn’t even make macaroni and cheese, the boxed kind.
    I understand. I knew that was the correct response, but I couldn’t force the words out. I felt another unwanted stab of competitiveness toward little Nick. Looking across the room, I took in a picture of him dressed in a Giants jersey, a massive football helmet hiding his face in shadow, so that only a huge smile showed. I envisioned myself getting into a squat like an NFL lineman and knocking him off the playing field. I was bigger than he was. . . .
    The thought was reprehensible, of course. It was only proof of what I already knew: I was the spoiled, self-centered, overindulged, late-in-life baby of the family and would never grow up. Completely hopeless.
    â€œSo . . . then . . . what . . .” What are you saying? What does this mean? What do you want me to say? I reached up and rubbed my eyebrows, then pinched hard, a little pulse thrumming beneath my fingertips. The I’m-not-going-to-cry feeling stung my throat. Daniel’s parents would be here tomorrow, road weary after driving from Ohio, and on their way to visit their other grandkids. Daniel and I had already established that this wasn’t the best time for me to meet them. They’re