Page 92 of Into the Dark
“What on earth did you think it was?”
“I don’t know, but please label those things in bold red letters or a skull or something so I never do that again, yeah?”
“I can’t believe you don’t like them.” I sigh with disappointment before popping another succulent olive into my mouth.
Jake shakes his head in disgust and turns around to Caleb. He isn’t laughing anymore but breathless, and his cheeks are pink, eyes glittering with excitement. “What are you laughing at? Maybe you should try one. They taste lovely, promise,” he says, moving across the blanket toward him. “Alex, hand me those olives over, will you, yeah?”
“Noooooooo!” Caleb howls, giggling again. “I don’t want to try one! I’m sorry for laughing at you, Daddy, I’m sorry! Don’t!”
After the hilarity has died down and the picnic depleted, Jake stands and offers to go buy us all an ice cream from the vendor by the gate. Caleb asks for “a surprise,” which I assume is in the literal sense and not the name of his favorite product. When he turns to me I also ask for a surprise, smiling as seductively as possible.
“Think I’ll go for something strawberry,” he muses, biting his lip. It causes a delicious shiver to move over my whole body. “You’ll be okay here?” he asks, nodding toward Caleb.
I nod. “Totally.”
He bends down to lift his phone and slips it into his back pocket, then he leans across and kisses me softly on the cheek. “I love you,” he whispers softly, grazing his tongue over the skin of my cheek. “Back in five,” he says and disappears.
Caleb is distracted, playing with an iPad that has a thick lime-green rubber cover on it. When I glance over to look at the screen I see a bouncing object, which he appears to move along with his finger. The object jumps and bursts into a ball of green, exploding light, and he says, “Yessssss!”
Closing my eyes, I lean back on my elbows and enjoy the soft breeze coming off the trees to our right. The sun has faded behind Kensington Palace, but the air is still warm and close as the soft wind dances featherlike and gentle across my neck, knees, and toes. What a lovely day it’s been. This couldn’t have gone better really. What a magnificent treat to witness Jake with his son. I feel like I’ve been allowed into the inner circle of something special. They have private jokes and a secret language sometimes, which is so beautiful to witness, and which doesn’t at all make me feel excluded—rather the opposite. He’s amazing with him. Natural and loving, and seeing him in this context makes me feel excited and hopeful about how he’ll feel when I tell him about the baby. It’s only been a few days since I did the test. When I see Laura and have everything confirmed properly, then I’ll tell him. He’ll understand why I waited these few days. He’ll understand I kept it to myself for the right reasons. I know he—
“Are you and my daddy going to get married?” The small voice bubbles up from my left.
I open my eyes and look down to find Caleb’s iPad discarded by his side and him watching me intently, legs crossed in a yoga-type pose, hands clasped between them. There’s no antagonism in his eyes, just genuine curiosity. I sit up and brush a hand through my hair as I decide how to answer that. How would Jake want me to answer that? I look behind me then to check he isn’t standing there or on his way back to us. Though something tells me if he were, Caleb wouldn’t have asked.
“I’m not sure,” I say softly.
He looks unconvinced and unsatisfied by my answer. His eyes—so much like Jake’s right now—burn hard into me.
“I mean, maybe one day. I’d like to marry your daddy one day. If he’d like to marry me, that is.”
“Daddy said he loves you. So that means he would.”
In response my heart does a sort of stumble, tripping over before it gets up and carries on hammering in my chest. Jake told his son he loves me? Oh my god, I feel emotional.
“Well, I love him too. But you know, just because he loves me, it doesn’t mean he loves you any less. People can love more than one person at a time.”
“I know. My daddy loves me the most of anyone,” he says with confidence.
I smile, nodding in agreement. “Oh yes, he does. He told me that himself.”
“If you marry my dad, does that mean you’ll be my new mummy?”
“No. God no, Caleb. Your mummy will always be your mummy. That doesn’t change. I mean, I wish I had a little boy like you, and I would be very happy to be your mum, but your mum and dad put all the jigsaw pieces together to make you, so that means they’ll always be your mum and dad.” The jigsaw piece analogy feels grossly superficial now.
He thinks about this for a long time, neither happy nor sad by this information. “And what if my mum died? Would you be my new mum then?”
My mouth drops open. “Why would your mum die?” My heart hammers harder now. What sort of little boy knows about death and dying at such a young age?
He shrugs and drops his eyes from mine.
“Well, she’s very young, your mum, and she isn’t sick, so your mummy isn’t going to die for a very, very long time. When you’re a lot older than your daddy is now.”
He nods and brings his finger up and starts nibbling on it the way Jake sometimes does when he’s stressed. I need to change the subject. If this conversation is stressing him out I need to change it.
“Your dad told me that you love lions. That they’re your favorite animal.”
He nods slowly and lifts his head. The finger stays in his mouth until he starts to speak. “I saw them at the zoo, but they were sleeping.”