He gave his daughter a kiss on the cheek. “You can if you’re hungry. I’ll be home soon.”
“Bye,” Becca said, waving at him.
Alana smirked at his daughter’s dismissal and went back to her dinner.
He grabbed his jacket and slipped it on over the button-down shirt he’d worn to work today. All he did was change out of his dress pants into jeans.
It was a ten-minute drive to the restaurant, Celia already waiting for him in the lobby.
He felt like shit, but he wasn’t late. There were still five minutes to spare.
“Hi,” Celia said, her hand reaching out for his. She was a touchy person, always running her hand down his arm or bumping into him.
“Sorry if I’m late,” he said. “My sitter canceled earlier and I got someone else and I had to make sure she and Becca were fine.”
“Oh,” Celia said. “I’m glad you wanted this date as much as me to get another sitter, but you could have brought her to my house with Polly. My sitter wouldn’t have minded and then the girls could have had a little play date.”
“I wouldn’t do that to your sitter,” he said. “And Polly has her brother to play with.”
“Asher doesn’t like to play with his younger sister.” Celia let out an annoying little giggle. “I thought having two close together would make it easier, but I was wrong.”
He pulled the door open to the restaurant and held it for her. “I was an only child and wished for a sibling.”
“I’ve got sisters,” Celia said. “We fought all the time. You didn’t want any more? I have to ask, if you don’t mind. It’s rare for the man to end up with primary custody.”
Going right into it. Not that rare in his mind.
Lots of men had shared custody, at the very least.
“Becca’s mother’s career makes it hard for her to be a single mother.”
“Oh,” Celia asked. “What does she do? Does she at least get weekends or something?”
He read the underlying message there. So that he had free weekends.
“She’s an international flight attendant. She’s gone all the time and at odd hours. It worked out better this way.”
He wasn’t about to say that Rene didn’t want their child. He always knew that deep down.
Once he found out his ex had been sleeping with multiple men while they were together, their relationship was over in his mind.
“Sometimes I wish my ex had the kids more. Every other weekend and two nights during the week. He said it’s too much to always have them switching houses during the week and keeping track of who picks them up and when. It’d give me a break, that is for sure.”
Celia had two strikes against her. First, she’d crossed a line by getting too personal about Becca’s mother, and nearly insulting the fact that he was raising his daughter full time. Second, she openly admitted she didn’t want to spend as much time with her own kids.
Not the kind of woman he wanted in his life.
He was going to keep an open mind, but it was closing rapidly.
“I always say there’d be no break if we were still together,” he said.
Celia waved her hand. “Nah. That’s what sitters and grandparents are for. Your whole life can’t be about your kids. You still have to live some too.”
He knew a lot of people who felt that way. That could balance it.
Maybe if he had a solid relationship, he’d be fine with it too.
He’d just yet to discover that.
