Page 50 of Cooking Up My Comeback

We make our way to the face-painting tent, wheretwo college-aged girls are expertly dabbing paint on squirming kids. Crew chooses a sea bass—naturally. Mason asks for “a rainbow dragon with flames,” and somehow they deliver.

The transformation is immediate. Crew starts swimming through the air, making fish faces. Mason puffs his cheeks and lets out garbled roars at anyone who’ll pay attention.

“Impressive work,” I tell the face painters, handing over a twenty. “You’ve created monsters.”

“The good kind,” one of them says with a grin.

As we wander toward the cotton candy booth, Mason tugs on my shirt. “Mama, is Brett gonna come to my birthday party?”

The question stops me cold. “I... we haven’t talked about that, buddy.”

“But he should come. He likes dragons, and he’s funny when he’s not being grumpy.”

Out of the mouths of babes.

“Brett’s very nice,” I say carefully. “But he’s Mama’s work friend. Like how Daddy has work friends.”

Mason’s face scrunches up in confusion. “But Daddy’s work friends don’t come over and help fix things. And they don’t know about Larry.”

Crew overhears and swims over, still making fish faces. “Brett’s different than Daddy’s friends. He actually listens when I talk about marine biology. Eventhough he looked kind of scared when I explained lobster reproduction.”

There it is. The comparison I’ve been dreading and hoping they wouldn’t make. Because they’re right—Brett is different. He shows up. He pays attention. He treats my kids like their thoughts and stories matter, even when he clearly doesn’t know what to do with them.

Which is exactly why I need to be careful.

“Can we talk about this later?” I ask, suddenly needing space from the conversation and the festival crowd and the weight of my own confusion.

“Sure,” Tally says, appearing at my side with cotton candy. “But Mom? Just so you know—he keeps looking over here like he’s worried about us. That’s not really normal boss behavior.”

I glance back toward our booth and sure enough, Brett’s watching us while he stacks chairs. When he catches me looking, he immediately scowls and goes back to his cleaning with renewed aggression.

“See?” Tally says. “He’s like a grumpy guard dog.”

My heart does that skippy thing it’s been doing more and more lately, and I realize Tally’s right. This stopped being just about business somewhere between the sledgehammer lessons and the festival prep and the way he makes my kids laugh despite clearly being out of his element.

The question is: what am I going to do about it?

By the time we get back to my parents’ house, the boys are buzzing with sugar and stories about dragons, fishing, and chili competitions. Mom settles them in the den with bowls of popcorn and a Pixar movie while Dad flips between college football and a fishing show.

Tally disappears to raid the fridge, and I slip out the sliding glass door with Mom, both of us carrying mugs of chamomile tea.

The back porch is draped in twinkle lights, and a breeze rustles the trees along the intracoastal. I sink into the Adirondack chair with a sigh.

“Long day?” Mom asks, settling beside me.

“Complicated day,” I say, watching the sky fade to purple. “Successful, but complicated.”

She studies me over her tea. “Want to talk about the complicated part?”

I wrap both hands around my mug, using the warmth to steady myself. “The boys are getting attached to Brett.”

“And that scares you.”

“It terrifies me. Mason’s already asking about birthday parties. Crew’s comparing him to Chad—favorably. And Tally...” I shake my head. “Tally sees right through me. She knows this isn’t just business anymore.”

“Is it?”

The question hangs in the cooling air between us. “I don’t know. Maybe. Probably.” I take a shaky breath. “And that’s the problem. I wasn’t supposed to fall for my business partner. I was supposed to keep this professional and safe and separate from my kids.”