Wild Love: Chapter 11

“I told you I’ll eat anything.” On a stool at the kitchen counter, Cora is absorbed in reading a book. She doesn’t bother looking up to answer my question about her dinner preferences. She just keeps reading. While I flail around trying to find out what she likes to eat so I can make it for her.

We just tried calling her mom at the treatment center, but Marilyn wasn’t available, and it took the wind out of her sails—even if she won’t admit it. She’s trying to be cool, but I can tell she misses her mom, and I don’t blame her at all.

That’s why I’m trying to make it better.

“If I could cook you anything in the world, what would you pick?” I try to clarify my question as I stare into the refrigerator. Admittedly, not everything in the world is in here. But if she would tell me what she actually likes, I could try something similar. I mean, shit. I could have it brought in.

“Anything.” I see her shrug out of the corner of my eye and wonder if this is how I was growing up. I’d know if I bothered to tell my family about this situation. My mom, my dad, my big-mouth sister. They’d all have something to say about it. I’m sure they’d all have good advice too. But they’d also come with criticisms. I worry they’ll tell me I shouldn’t have done this with Cora. That it was impulsive. That I’m putting myself at financial risk. That I’m under no obligation to help in this situation.

And they’d be right. But the truth is, I’m feeling startlingly protective of Cora.

Any critical comment or advice that I do less than I already am could make me go borderline feral. Like full papa bear mode. And it’s an unfamiliar feeling. One I’m still grappling with. One that’s keeping me from seeking outside advice.

“So, frog legs?”

Her hazel eyes pop up over the top of the book. “Sure.”

“Liver?”

“I love it.”

“Caviar?”

“Your rich kid is showing.”

Fuck me, that was funny. I wipe a hand across my mouth to hide my smirk.

“Hot dogs?”

She gives me a confused look. “You know, that’s actually the most offensive food on that list. Do you have any idea what’s in them?”

I reach into the fridge and inspect the package. “Meat trimmings.”

Cora just nods. But she’s finally not ignoring me for whatever Stephen King horror shit she’s reading in an attempt to be as anti-stereotypical as possible.

“Are they less offensive if we roast them over a fire?”

For a moment, her eyes light up before she goes back to trying to look cool and unaffected. “Do you have stuff for s’mores?”

I’m a thirty-two-year-old bachelor workaholic. Of course I don’t have stuff for s’mores. But I only say, “I don’t.”

She probably thinks she’s unreadable, but I don’t miss the way her shoulders fall.

“I can go grab the ingredients.”

“No. It’s fine. Hot dogs on a fire sound great. I’ll go grab a sweater.”

After she stomps up the stairs, I get to problem-solving. Because if that girl wants s’mores, she’s going to have them.

A quick swipe across my phone’s screen pulls up Rosie’s contact information, and I hit call.

“I knew you were stalking me,” she answers.

I roll my eyes, standing in my big, empty kitchen, and cut to the chase. “Do you have the stuff to make s’mores?”

“Dude. Have you seen the bunkhouse? I have a hot plate, a toaster oven, and a kettle in the corner. I’m living on the wrong brand of sour cream and onion chips because the grocery store here doesn’t stock Old Dutch.”

“Okay, never mind⁠—”

“Of course I have the ingredients for s’mores.”

“You’re a hot mess, Rosalie.”

“All I heard was that you think I’m hot.”

I say nothing to that. There’s no safe answer. Especially not when my neck gets all red at the mere mention.

“Can I swing by and grab the ingredients?”

“No.”

“No?”

“Why would I share them with you? You’re a bajillionaire.”

“That’s not an actual term.”

“I know, but it has a more satisfying and ridiculous ring to it.”

I try one last time. “They’re for Cora.”

Rosie goes quiet and then, “Oh. Well, why didn’t you say so? I’ll bring them over.”

Then she hangs up on me.

“You know how to start a fire?”

Cora stands at my back as I arrange the sticks and newspaper at the bottom of the fire pit.

“I do.”

“I’d have thought you had a butler to do it for you.”

I sit back on my heels, kneeling as I look up into Cora’s snarky little face. “Man. Did you and Rosie make some sort of evil plan to mock me mercilessly today?”

A small giggle I’ve never heard from her tumbles out. “No. But I wish we had.”

“You women are going to give me a complex,” I say, dusting my hands clean. “You wanna light it?”

“Me?”

“Yeah. I feel like adding pyromania to your personality profile would be a good fit.”

Cora doesn’t laugh. She stares at me, considering my words. I wonder if I shouldn’t have said them. Probably shouldn’t be ragging on a twelve-year-old.

My twelve-year-old daughter.

But then she says, “That was funny.”

“Yeah?”

Another small giggle. “Yeah. And I want to light it. Show me how.”

“You’ve never done this before?”

She shrugs. “My dad had ALS.”

I know as much, but I’m missing how that has anything to do with lighting a fire.

“So, like… he just became more immobile every year, for most of my life. My mom took care of him. I tagged along. We didn’t do camping or anything. Or maybe we did when I was too young to remember.”

Without hesitation, I decide this is what we’ll do—all the things she never got to. Simple things. Childhood things. Things that include her.

This is what Marilyn wanted for her.

“Well, believe it or not, my parents loved to camp. Before they bought their cabin here—when I was your age, actually—we went camping all the time. Hell, we still went camping even when they got their place.”

“Your parents have a place here?”

I nod while reaching for the long-arm lighter I brought down from the house.

“Can I meet them sometime?”

Her question catches me off guard. People usually just want to meet my dad because he’s, well, him. Famous. “You want to meet my parents?”

Another shrug. I swear her traps must be extra strong with all the unaffected shrugging she does. “Yeah. I never got to do the whole grandparent thing. Might be kind of all right.”

I blink a few times, trying to process that she wants to meet my parents for the grandparent experience. She should be careful what she wishes for because after seeing them with my sister’s kids, I know how over-the-top they are.

“Okay. Yeah. I’ll find out when they’ll be here.” I don’t tell her I haven’t told them about her, and I suddenly feel sick that I haven’t.

“I brought beers and s’mores!” Rosie announces, popping my bubble of guilt as she walks up from the lake.

The fence line between the two properties doesn’t extend to the water, so it’s more direct to walk over than to bother driving around. Still, her presence surprises me. It takes me back to when we were kids, ripping around town on our bikes like the little gang of misfits we were. Showing up at each other’s houses unannounced. Messy hair, dirt under our nails, sun-bleached hair.

Not a care in the world.

Rosie looks nothing like that anymore. She’s wearing an oversized, bright-white, fuzzy fleece that reminds of a blanket. Her hair is drawn up in a high pony, held in place with a neon-pink velvet scrunchie. And she’s rounded the ensemble off with plush socks, Birkenstocks, and a pair of black leggings.

Some people might think she looks like a hot mess, as I told her earlier. But I think she’s just plain hot. Blazers and high heels all day, then this at night. I think what I find appealing about the dichotomy is she clearly just wears what she wants—what she feels like—and looks good in it all.

I don’t get the sense she gives a single fuck about what I think of her, and I find that refreshing as hell.

The longer I watch her, the more a heavy tightness takes over my chest. I press my palm there to ease the ache. Willing myself to not think too hard about my body’s reaction.

“Hi!” Cora welcomes her so brightly that I almost do a double take. The enthusiasm at seeing Rosie is unexpected, but also… same.

“Hello, my little storm cloud,” Rosie says as she places her drinks and food on the grass.

My little storm cloud?

She makes her way to the firepit where we’re crouching and ruffles Cora’s black hair affectionately. Cora rolls her eyes but smiles shyly down at the ground. Leave it to Rosie to blast through any walls or tendrils of discomfort. That’s her gift. The ability to walk into a room and make everyone like her without even trying.

She’s the sun, the rest of us are just dumb rocks orbiting her.

“Hello, my big storm cloud,” she says to me, before turning her knuckles onto my scalp and giving me a noogie.

“Very professional, Rosalie.”

I don’t let myself look at her, but I freeze when I feel the nail of her index finger trace along the shell of my ear. I know she’s being playful, but I suck in a sharp breath all the same.

One I hold when she leans down, face close enough to really be unprofessional. Her breath fans across my neck when she whispers, “We’re not at work right now, Junior.”

I glare at her from the corner of my eye, but Cora interrupts me.

Laughing.

“He really does hate that, doesn’t he?”

I know they mean the nickname, but I’m still caught up in the feel of Rosie’s fingers on my skin. I didn’t hate that part at all.

Rosie steps away, ending the contact. “Oh yeah. Always has. I brought you a soda since you can’t drink beer.” Rosie wobbles her head like she’s thinking that one over. “Yet. You can’t drink beer yet. When did we start, Ford?”

“I only remember you drinking gin and tonic.”

She sighs wistfully and flops down onto an empty stump as her seat. “God. I love gin and tonic. Panty remover.”

I cough, but Rosie forges ahead, ignoring me. “Anyway, Cora, I ran to the store and got you this root beer they make at the brewery in town.”

“You ran to the store?” I ask, urging Cora closer so we can get the fire lit.

Rosie shrugs. “I mean, yeah. I wasn’t going to show up without something for Cora.”

Cora kneels beside me, and it makes me realize that for all her big attitude she is still really very small. Her legs next to mine. Her hands as they wrap around the lighter.

I stare at her, struggling to push up the safety lock while also igniting the flame. It hits me how young she is, how alone she is, that she’s been here for days, and I’ve spent that time being awkward as hell around her.

“Here.” I reach my arm over her shoulders. “I’ll do the safety. You squeeze the ignition and light the paper.”

Cora nods and captures her tongue between her lips in concentration. It seems like a simple enough thing, using a lighter. I think back to her sitting in the kitchen earlier, reading her book, staying out of the way, being perfectly agreeable, and I realize she’s adapted to be amenable to anything just to make things easier on her parents.

“There! It’s lit! It’s going!” She squeals in excitement while I find the bridge of my nose stinging as I watch her get excited over a simple flame.

“Okay, easy now,” I say as she holds the flame to the crumpled newspaper. “You’re going to blow on it gently.”

“Won’t that put it out?”

“No, just gently enough to spread the flame.”

She doesn’t look at me, but she hands over the lighter and then places her palms on the bricks surrounding the pit, blowing gently. When the flames brighten, so do her eyes. So does everything about her, and I finally feel like I’m doing something for this girl other than just being her legal guardian.

I find myself smiling too. But I’m not watching the flames.

I’m watching Cora.

And when I glance up, Rosie’s eyes are also alight. Except she’s watching me.