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CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

ALL TREATS, NO TRICKS

JAX

“ Y ou can’t go as a doctor again, Dad!” Mackenzie shouts down the hall from her bedroom while I grab a clean pair of scrubs. I’ve been a doctor every year since the girls were old enough to trick or treat because I usually join them back at Mom and Dad’s after getting out of work. But this year is different. This year, we’re getting ready at home, and I actually get to take them trick or treating.

“Then what should I be?” I poke my head out my bedroom door and wait for one of my girls to respond.

“Baseball player!” Alice yells as she steps into the hallway in her little pantsuit and sneakers. For the second year in a row, she insisted on being “Aunt Nelope” for Halloween, and I can’t argue with her. Her hair is pulled back into a sleek ponytail that makes her look much older than her eight years, and the costume glasses perched on her nose seal the deal.

“Or a soccer player,” Mackenzie steps into the hallway in her shorts and National Team jersey, looking ready to take on the world, and I can’t stop the emotion that squeezes in my chest at the sight of my girls standing here looking so grown up. I remember my first Halloween with both girls. We were living with my parents at the time, and Mom picked their costumes. Alice was a pumpkin and Mackenzie was a black cat; they were adorable, and so small. We didn’t trick or treat that year, but seeing them in their costumes brought some much needed joy.

“Both good options,” I nod, thoughtfully. I know my girls, and while I’d love to take either suggestion, I don’t want either one to think that I’m playing favorites, so I step back into my room and shut the door behind me. Pulling on a pair of jeans and a Teddy Roosevelt Elementary sweatshirt, I dig out an old pair of sneakers from the back of my closet, and decide that I’m going to just be Dad this year. I don’t care that it’s not a costume. It’s the role of a lifetime, and one that I’m honored to fill every single day. And if anyone has a problem with that, too bad.

The eye roll that my ten year old gives me when I walk out of my room is all the encouragement I need that I nailed the costume this year. After piling into the car, we make the short trip to Mom and Dad’s for dinner and our first two trick or treat stops at their house and James and Amanda’s. Mom and Dad are in their yearly firefighter and dalmatian costumes, and James and Mandy are in Victorian era costumes that no one understands but them. Apparently they are the characters in a book that James has been desperately trying to get Jake and me to read. I have the book that James forced on me, and I’ve started it, but I can’t stay awake to read at night like I used to.

Jake and Penelope are here by way of the television screen in the background as they broadcast a special postseason edition of On the Field from the stadium where the first game of the championship series is being played. Leigh and Junie are staying with Mom and Dad until their parents are back in New York, and I know how hard it was for Penelope and Jake to leave their girls and fly across the country for the start of the series.

With Junie on my lap and Charlie Gehringer, mom’s therapy dog in training, at our feet waiting for crumbs, the family gathers around Mom and Dad’s table for dinner together. The girls chatter excitedly about school and the soccer games we watched together this morning, Leigh eats and babbles as she sees her parents on the television screen in the living room, and the rest of us prepare ourselves for trick or treating with four children.

James and Mandy take Leigh and Junie to a few houses before calling it a night, and taking the girls back to Mom and Dad’s while I load my own girls into the car and drive back to our neighborhood. After a quick stop at home to empty out the haul from Mom and Dad’s street, we take off down the sidewalk to the neighbors’ houses. I hang back and watch as the girls approach the houses together, with a reminder every now and then to say thank you and not just run off.

My girls avoid any house that’s decorated with scary decorations, not wanting to risk what may meet them on the porch or the other side of the door. When we come to a house with a skeleton in a soccer goal, the girls determine it’s not overly scary, and with a nudge from me, they approach the familiar house, and this time, I follow them to the door.

“Trick-or-treat!” They call out, waiting for the door to open, and when it does, I’m not disappointed. Emma stands in the threshold of her door with bare feet, jeans that hug her legs, and the same crewneck sweatshirt that I’m wearing. Her mahogany hair hangs in loose waves past her shoulders, and as she dumps the last bits of candy into my daughters’ bags she turns off her porch light and invites us all inside.

The girls race in ahead of me and disappear into Emma’s kitchen while I pull her into my arms and kick the front door shut behind us, greeting her with a kiss.

“Hi there, Beautiful.”

“Hi.”

Twining her arms around my neck, Emma presses her body against mine and deepens the kiss, breaking it only when we’re interrupted by Mackenzie coming around the corner into the entryway.

“Coach – NEVER MIND,” she yells, heading back the way she came.

Emma buries her face in my neck, body shaking with laughter as we make our way to the kitchen where the girls are waiting for us. Emma has popcorn and apple cider for the girls, which they dig into as Emma turns on the first game of the World Championship in the living room. It’s wild to watch Jake and Penelope on the pregame show, baseball’s biggest stage behind them, and my girls watch with rapt attention.

“So,” I join Emma on the couch, draping an arm around her shoulders as she leans into me, keeping my voice low. “Have you talked with Mrs. Owens yet?”

Emma exhales a sigh, dropping her head to my shoulder.

“Yes,” she grumbles. “And she was frustratingly understanding about it all.”

“Why was that frustrating?” I chuckle, pulling her closer to me.

“Because I went in there expecting her to be upset. To yell. Maybe even fire me. But no, she had to be nice to me. It’s your fault.”

“How is this my fault?”

“She likes you.”

“She scares me.”

“That’s because she loves you, Jax. And the girls. I can’t tell you how many times she’s told me that you’re like family to her and Mr. Owens.”

“When I met them, we’d just moved to Saratoga, and I hated it here. I was an angry teenager and Mrs. Owens was the long suffering English teacher who had to deal with me. She suggested I visit the hardware store one weekend, and I met Mr. Owens. He gave me a job, a purpose, and taught me healthy ways to channel my anger. Then I started bringing my brothers around to the hardware store with me, and Mr. Owens would talk about baseball with Jake, taught James woodworking, and by then I was his weekend manager.”

“What about Jenna?” Emma asks, a hint of indignance in her voice. “Wasn’t she allowed at the hardware store?”

“No,” I laugh, “And not for the reason you’d think. Jenna wasn’t with us because she was usually spending her Saturdays at the library tutoring middle school students who needed help with science.”

“That tracks.” Emma and Jenna haven’t met yet, but I’m hoping that they will on Thanksgiving, if Jenna and Marcus can make it home. My sister is one of the most important people in my life, and Emma has heard all kinds of Jenna stories from me and the girls, so I can’t wait for them to meet.

“Mom started inviting them for holidays, and holidays became Sunday dinners, and when the girls got old enough for recitals and concerts and school events they were invited to those as well.”

“Like an extra set of grandparents,” Emma muses. I need to tell her. She’s giving me an opening.

“Made it feel a little less like my girls were missing out without a mother around.”

This is getting dangerously close to a discussion that I know Emma and I need to have if this thing between us is as serious as I hope it is. I can’t have the girls getting attached to someone who may not stick around. Emma has that contract offer looming over her head, and I can’t stand the thought of not having her in my life. I can’t stand the thought of her not being here.

I know we need to have that conversation at some point, and figure out if we’re on just as much of a ticking clock as Emma’s career. But right now? With her in my arms, the girls sitting nearby, nothing else matters. Right now I just want to hold Emma in my arms, watch baseball, and then tuck my girls into bed and know that they are safe and sound.

“I know it’s early,” Emma says, grabbing a blanket and covering most of her lower body and mine with the soft fleece, “but tell me everything I need to know about a Hutchinson Family Thanksgiving.”

“There’s going to be a lot of food, and a lot of noise.” I know that Emma gets overwhelmed when a lot of people are around, or when everyone is trying to speak at once, and a Hutchinson Holiday Table is guaranteed to have everyone trying to talk at once. “Mom and Dad have a habit of adopting people who don’t have family around, and the majority of them end up at our table for Thanksgiving. Speaking of which, have you invited your sister? She’s more than welcome.”

“I have,” Emma answers with a bit of wistful longing in her voice. “I’m excited to see her, usually she’s traveling around but, She’ll be staying at Mom and Dad’s while they’re on their cruise, so she’ll drive in from Boston in the morning and probably drive back the same night.”

“In that case, now might be a good time to let you know that your invitation is for more than just Thursday.”

Emma sits up and turns to me, confusion wrinkling her brow. “What do you mean?”

“I mean – and you don’t have to say yes, you are under no obligation to do any of this. At all – but, Mom wanted me to let you know that you’re welcome to come over Wednesday morning for prep day and stay through to Saturday morning. As a part of the family.”

Emma’s eyes are wide as dinner plates and panic colors her features. If I could reel this one back in, I could. It’s clearly too much, too soon, and as much as I’d love to have her as a part of our family in that way, I can tell by her reaction that we’re not in that place yet. I shouldn’t have asked. I shouldn’t have put the pressure on her to do any part of this.

“When you say stay through Saturday …?”

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have even asked. I should have told Mom that we’re not there, we’re taking things slow. This , Thanksgiving, staying the night, all of it, it’s not slow. I’m sorry Emma. I thought we were…”

“Jax,” a slow smile spreads across Emma’s face, “I think maybe, we could speed things up a bit. If you wanted to.”

I want to.

I wish I could tell her how much I want to.

But all I can think about is that contract offer, that decision that she has to make. Right now though, as she looks at me, arms coming around my neck in an embrace, I push all thoughts of that decision to the very back of my mind, and kiss her as if my daughters aren’t in the room.