Page 3 of Scoring Chances

I looked it up once. Only two percent of the world's population have teal eyes. I have a better chance of being stuck by lightening than running into someone with that rare trait. Let alone three of them.

Universe: 3… and counting.

Hicks: 0

So… in the same weekend the Heatwave won their first Stanley Cup, I found out that I’d be leaving the next season and that I had half-siblings… three, of course, because fuck me. And I’d be their sole caretaker.

To say I was royally screwed would be an understatement. But now. Now I think the universe really does just hate me.

Because the icing on my shit cake it decided to deliver this summer is that the only nanny I’ve been able to convince to help me watch three kids over the next few weeks, hates me.

Loves kids. Hates me. Those were Fergie’s words when he brought up the idea of asking his ex-almost-sister-in-law if her nanny friend would be open to a summer gig that paid well.

A little too well, since I was desperate and had already failed with the first nanny I asked to help.

I’m sure I would’ve had plenty of interest if I was a normal single dad looking for the help of a reputable nanny. But I’m not a normal single dad. I’m a reluctant legal guardian that has to figure out what to do with three hooligans before I leave for training camp in the fall.

All while keeping the whole three kids in my care things under wraps because my mom could never find out about them. She’d–well–I don’t know what she’d do. But I’d rather not be around to see how she would react to me taking in the devil’s spawn.

So yeah. That’s what’s happening. I think we’re all caught up.

“Hicks?” Landry calls out to me from the other side of my closet door.

“What?”

“Who are you talking to in there?”

I look around at the three empty beer bottles and the half-eaten chocolate bar in my hand.

“Nobody. I’m just doing a little self-reflection. You’re very rude for interrupting,” I say, grabbing my Heatwave jersey I’ve been snuggling and tossing it to the side.

I get up and open the door. He’s leaning on the wall outside of it, arms crossed waiting for me. “Are you sulking?”

I scoff. “No, sulking would require me to have emotions. And I’m dead inside.”

He purses his lips and gives me a once-over, before pushing off the wall and heading out the door.

“Parker’s stuck… again,” he says over his shoulder.

Of course, he is.

The toddler has managed to get stuck in three different places since being put in my care. It’s like he knows that this place is a jail sentence. A holding place of broken dreams. And we’re all prisoners. He’s just trying to bust out.

And honestly, so should I.

Chapter 2

Cassidy

The crazy thing about growing up as a pastor’s kid is the kind of information you’re privy to starting at a very young age.

I’d hear my parents whisper to each other in the the kitchen while washing dishes often.

“Did you hear about Carl and Linda?”

“Yeah. They’re going through with the divorce.”

“Really? Man, I had so much hope that they’d try to work things out. If not for them then at least for Lillian and Mark. Those poor kids.”