Flipping Love You by Erin Nicholas

16

“Here you go, honey.”

Jill looked up to find Ellie at her side. She was still next to Zeke, but he was having fun talking to the group. The whole group. Okay, minus the kids and their dads now, but there were still a lot of people in here.

Jill had been mostly sitting back and letting the conversation roll around her. She had actually been surprised by, but appreciative of the way the Landrys were able to include her in a conversation by making eye contact and directing comments toward her without putting her on the spot and asking her anything specific.

Until the question about getting married came up, of course.

But Zeke had swiftly changed that subject.

With a little help from his friends.

Those kids were…a lot. And she suspected watching them was like looking back on the Landry cousins when they were those ages.

It was all just a bit overwhelming and it made her want to crawl into Zeke’s lap, wrap her arms around his neck, and rest her head on his shoulder.

Which had to be the strangest urge she’d ever had in her life.

She wasn’t a cuddler any more than she was a hugger, but Zeke had a way of making her feel comforted and taken care of. And making her want more and more of it.

No, he didn’t have first-aid supplies at his house and he couldn’t make grilled cheese, but he made her feel sure that she would always have first-aid and grilled cheese if and when she ever needed them.

It was weird. And probably hormonal.

“What’s this?”

But it was obvious what it was. Ellie Landry, the owner of the most popular local restaurant and a cook extraordinaire, had just set down the bowl of frosted fruity cereal. She set a tiny silver pitcher next to the bowl that Jill knew held milk.

“I thought maybe you could use some comfort food.”

“I thought comfort food was stuff like pasta and grits and, around here, gumbo.”

“What comforts us depends on who we are.”

Jill blinked rapidly. She got fussed over by her own family, but it had been a while. She knew the teariness definitely had something to do with hormones. Still, she very much appreciated it.

“It’s that obvious I needed comforting?”

Ellie pulled out the empty seat next to Jill. Jill frowned. She didn’t remember there being an empty seat next to her. But before she could ponder that further Ellie was sitting and leaning in.

“You’re unexpectedly pregnant. And thrown into the middle of all of this. And you’ve only been here for six weeks. And things aren’t going so well at work. Yeah, I guess I figured maybe you needed comforting.”

“How did you know things weren’t going well at work?”

Ellie smiled. “Zeke talks about you a lot. Probably more than he realizes.”

Jill sighed. “That’s nice. Except that what he’s talking about is true.”

“Do you always get things right with the penguins?”

Jill thought about that for a moment. Then she nodded. “Yes. Penguins are the one thing I know for sure. I’ve spent my life studying them. Working with them. I’ve dedicated myself to them. All of my time and energy. And now, I’ve been entrusted with these eight and I can’t seem to make anything work.” She looked at Ellie. “How am I supposed to have a baby and make sure it’s safe and healthy and raised properly when I can’t even take care of the things that I have literally spent years figuring out?”

“Ah,” Ellie said, nodding. “And that’s why you need comforting.”

“Yeah, I guess so. No offense to your grandson and all, but Zeke and I don’t really have any business raising another human being.”

Ellie chuckled. “Why is that?”

“Because we are both completely irresponsible.”

“Now what makes you say that?”

“I can’t get to any appointments on time. I don’t remember birthdays or other important dates. He keeps falling off of things or getting hurt other ways. Neither of us should really be using a stove. If you give either of us anything other than cotton or denim we’ll probably ruin it.”

“The problem is that your definition of responsible is wrong.”

“What do you mean? Being responsible is being able to take care of things, right?”

“Being responsible is making sure that the things that need taking care of get taken care of. And I believe it means admitting when you’re not the best one to take care of something and calling whoever is. For instance, if something needs built or fixed, Zeke or Mitch should do it. But if your dog is sick, Tori or Griffin should take care of that. And if you need kickass shrimp creole or the best muffuletta you’ve ever had, you call Cora. But you want bread pudding that’ll ruin you for all others, you call me.”

“But shouldn’t we be the best ones for our baby?”

Ellie scoffed. “Having a baby means you just magically know how to fix everything and heal everything and make everything?”

“I guess…not.”

“I’ve done it five times. And those five have done it eleven more times total. And I can promise you that none of us have all the answers even now.”

“But…I like having answers.”

“You’re going to have to get over that.”

This wasn’t particularly reassuring.

“If it makes you feel better,” Ellie said, reading her expression. “By number five, you do know a bit more than you do with number one.”

“Number five?” she repeated. Jill felt her stomach turn over. And she wasn’t sure if it was her or the baby reacting to the idea of having four more.

“But I’ll tell you a secret…every one of those babies will be different—thank God—so no matter how much experience you get, it won’t totally prepare you. It’s not like bread pudding, or building houses.” Ellie shrugged. “Actually, I’m guessin’ it’s a lot more like taking care of penguins.”

“How so?”

“For all they have in common, I’m guessin’ those birds are all individuals, right? Just when you think you know what you’re doin’, one will surprise you.”

“Or eight of them will surprise you.”

Ellie smiled. “Exactly.”

“Considering nothing is going according to plan with the penguins, that’s not really comforting,” Jill told her.

“Oh, did you think I was trying to be comforting?”

“You weren’t?”

“The cereal is supposed to be comforting. I’m here to tell you that being uncomfortable is just fine. If you’re not feeling discomfited about being a mom, you’re not taking it seriously enough.”

Jill felt how wide her eyes were. “So I should be worried and there’s nothing that can make me feel better?”

“I don’t know about should or shouldn’t… you just will worry. So there’s no sense in worrying about the worrying. What you can do about it, is ask for help. If nothin’ else, havin’ other people worry with you feels better than worryin’ alone.”

Jill thought about that. She appreciated Ellie’s honesty. She wasn’t saying it was all going to be all right. Which Jill wouldn’t have believed.

“It’s like a hurricane,” Ellie said.

“Having a baby is like a hurricane?” Jill asked.

“For sure. Once it’s comin’, it’s out of your hands to slow it down or stop it. You just have to hold on tight to something that’s anchored deep, pray a lot, and get ready to clean up a lot of mess.”

Jill gave a soft laugh. But…she looked at Zeke. Hold on tight to something that’s anchored deep. Yeah. She had that.

“And cleaning up messes is easier with more hands,” Ellie said. “That’s all I’m sayin’.”

“And there are a lot of hands around here,” Jill said with a nod. “That I do understand.”

“Yep. And you’ve got two of the best right there on that boy.” Ellie’s affectionate gaze settled on Zeke.

“He is pretty great,” Jill agreed.

“When he has a reason to be great, he sure is.”

“When he has a reason?”

“He’s the baby of the family. And we’ve all definitely let him be the baby. As far as I can tell, you’re the best thing to happen to him. He’s been less needy in the past few weeks than ever before.”

Jill felt her heart flip at that. “I didn’t get pregnant so that Zeke wouldn’t be the baby anymore.”

“I didn’t say the baby was the best thing to happen. You,” Ellie said. “Zeke’s been reading up on Galápagos penguins and the Galápagos Islands. He’s been helping round up the goats when Benny corrals them, because he knows that you would be upset if one of them gets hurt. He’s kept all of us away from the penguins and trust me, that is a big deal. Marcy at the grocery store told me that she’s seen Zeke more times in the past six weeks than she has in the previous six years put together. Bailey told me that they’ve had fewer complaints about Chuck being a nuisance because Zeke has been feeding him and keeping him down by the water’s edge so he stays out of your yard. Which keeps him out of other people’s yards too. And all of that was before he even knew about the baby.”

Jill knew she was staring. “He’s been taking care of the goats and Chuck?”

“And I guarantee you that before you came to town he would’ve just assumed somebody else would take care of it.”

“I’m not very good at letting people take care of me,” Jill said. But everything in her was saying, I want Zeke to take care of me.

Ugh. Pathetic. If nothing else, she was nine years older than him. She still didn’t love thinking about that too hard.

Ellie waved that away. “But he’s doin’ it anyway. Landrys aren’t that great about asking for permission.”

Jill thought about that. So she had been good for Zeke. And while she definitely appreciated him keeping the alligator out of her yard, Zeke didn’t just do things for her. He calmed her down. He made her smile. He made her feel amazing instead of weird. And he actually decreased her stress levels. When he was around, she felt more confident and calm. And definitely happier.

“Do you think I’m a terrible person for never having wanted to be a mother?”

Suddenly Ellie Landry’s opinion of her mattered a lot. She didn’t try to explain it or figure it out. A lot of things seemed to happen suddenly in Autre with the Landry family.

Ellie scoffed. “I love pecan pie. But I don’t want to eat it twenty-four seven. I love goin’ to church, but I don’t want to sit there twenty-four seven. Being a mom is a twenty-four seven job and it’s okay to not like it every single one of those hours.”

“I never planned on doing it for any hours though.”

“Just because you can have a baby, doesn’t mean you have to want to.”

“I’ve been thinking about it a lot the last few days,” Jill said. “And I don’t know that it’s that I don’t want to. I just never planned to. And now I’m trying to adjust to this new reality. I was always given the impression by my mother that you can’t do more than one thing really well. And that if there’s something that you really, really want to do and you want to be the best at it, then it has been the only thing you do. So, a long time ago, I decided I wanted to study and work with penguins and I told myself I wasn’t going to do anything else.”

“And now you’re figuring out there’s something else you have to do?”

“Yeah, and I’m afraid I’m not going to be able to do either one well.”

“Lots of people work and have kids.”

“But I tend to go all in. I’m really afraid that if I have the baby and keep working, the penguins will come first.”

“So what are you saying?”

“I…” Jill took a deep breath. Then swallowed. Then finally said out loud what she’d been thinking about for the past week. “I think I need to give up the penguins.”

Wow. Hearing the words out loud made them feel real.

Ellie looked shocked. “You would give up the penguins for your baby?”

“Of course. It’s what moms do, right?” It was what her own mom had done. “Besides it’s really unfair to the penguins too. I’m not really doing a good job with them. Turns out this is all I know and…it’s not working. Maybe this is the universe’s sign that I’m not one who should have these penguins.”

“Who should have them then?”

“There are a number of people who would take them. I’ve already made a couple calls.”

There were three people in the Galápagos penguin project alone who were interested in adding her penguins to their collections.

“Honey, I don’t want you to feel like you have to do that,” Ellie said, looking concerned. “I don’t know anything about penguins, but I know a lot about diapers and discipline. I can help with those while you raise those penguin babies.”

Yeah, well, there were no penguin babies. But there was a human baby.

And she only had a few months to learn everything she needed to know about him or her.

She’d spent the past nearly ten years, learning everything she could about penguins, even more if she went way back to all the books she’d read as a kid, and, clearly, she still didn’t know everything she needed to know.

She really did like having all the answers.

And according to Ellie—who would clearly know—she needed to get over that.

Jill looked at Zeke. Hold on tight to something that’s anchored deep.

He was laughing and talking with his brother, but he looked over and caught her eye and gave her a wink.

At least she’d gotten that part right.

* * *

“Hey, it would be really great if you would stop buying my girlfriend things and doing stuff for her,” Zeke told his brother, as Zeke caught Jill’s eye and gave her a wink.

She’d been talking with Ellie and she looked…thoughtful.

Ellie had that effect on people.

Zander lifted his bottle of beer to his lips. “What do you mean?”

Zeke turned back to his brother. “If Jill needs anything, I’m the guy. Got it?”

Zander smirked. “Look, if my neighbor needs her drain snaked, I’m not gonna say no.”

Zeke narrowed his eyes. “Jill does not need her drain snaked.”

“Not at the moment anyway. I took care of that four days ago.”

“You did not snake her drain.”

“Well, I offered. And I made sure she knows I’m available any time she needs it.”

“Stop saying it like that.”

Zander smirked at him. “Like what?”

“Like you’re talking about more than pulling gross, clumpy wet hair out of her actual drain.” Zeke shuddered as he said it. He could handle blood, vomit, and even animal poop, but wet hair in a shower drain was disgusting.

Still, would he put up with it for Jill?

Absolutely.

“Okay,” Zander said. “Then you probably don’t want to talk about the jelly I gave her.”

Zeke’s frown intensified. “The what?”

“I totally gave her my jelly,” Zander said. “A whole bunch of it. Really sticky and sweet, and—”

“Knock it off.” Zeke knew Zander was just fucking with him but he still wanted to punch his brother in the mouth. Even the thought of another guy messing with Jill raised his blood pressure.

Zander laughed. “Relax. She came over to borrow a screwdriver for a lamp that got delivered and then we talked about Chuck a bit and she mentioned she needed grape jelly. So I traded with her. I got her strawberry, she got my grape.”

“And you gave her a dog catcher’s pole to use on Chuck?”

Zander chuckled. “That girl isn’t going to get that close to Chuck.”

“She said you told her she could at least poke him with it. Dammit, Zander, you can’t have her thinking that’s the way to defend herself with alligators.”

Zander gave him a long look. “Jill’s smarter than that. But I thought it would help her to feel a little safer if she had something in hand.”

He was right, of course, about Jill being smart. Zeke blew out a breath. “Yeah. Okay. I just…”

“You want to be the thing that makes her feel safe,” Zander filled in.

Yes. That was what he wanted. But it made him sound like an asshole out loud. “Yeah. But I don’t want her scared just so I can feel like some big hero.”

“I get it. And I like it. You’ve never gotten to be the big hero. Looks good on you.”

No, he’d never gotten to be the hero before. He’d never really wanted to be. That seemed like it came with a lot of expectations and responsibility.

But a lot of things had changed since Dr. Jillian Morris had come to town.

“I just want her…to know I’m there for her. To know she can depend on me.”

“She knows.” Zander lifted his beer bottle to his lips again. “I asked if she needed help with the lamp and she said if she did, she knew where to find you.”

Zeke felt the corner of his mouth curl. “Yeah?” It was just a lamp, but that still made him feel good.

“Yep. She even cut me off when I started to make a joke about screwing.”

Zeke’s grin grew and he glanced at the woman he’d accidentally gotten pregnant.

Best mistake ever.

“Just one thing you should know about your girlfriend, though,” Zander said.

“What’s that?”

“She’s allergic to strawberries. That’s why we traded jellies.”

Zeke frowned. “Why didn’t she tell me?”

“She thought you were being sweet and she didn’t want to hurt your feelings.” Zander leaned to set his beer bottle on the table. “But since she has to put up with you long term now, you should probably know that and try not to kill her.”

“Shit.” Zeke looked at Jill. “They can kill her?”

“Nah. Probably not. She said she breaks out in hives if she touches them though.”

“Oh, shit.”

“What?”

Zeke held up his bandaged hand. “She put Cora’s burn cream on me.” The cream that had strawberry juice in it.

“Oh, shit,” Zander agreed.

They both looked over at Jill. She was scratching the palm of one of her hands and they could see little red welts starting to show up.

“You know what,” Zeke said. “Never mind what I said. Keep helping. Any time you think we need you to step in. Jill and I both definitely need help.”

Zander laughed. “You’ve got it, baby brother. I’ve always got you. And now Jill. No matter what.”

* * *

“Here you go, darlin’,” Cora said, bustling over with a jar of blueish white cream. “This will help with those hives.”

Jill looked up, then down at her palms. She’d been so caught up in her thoughts about Zeke and the baby and the penguins that she’d barely registered how itchy her hands were.

“Wha—”

Suddenly Zeke was scooting his chair so he was facing Jill’s and taking the jar from Cora.

Cora smiled at him. “Just rub it in right over the hives. They should clear up quick. The itching will get better within a few minutes. Reapply as needed.”

“Got it.”

He unscrewed the top and took one of Jill’s hands, cradling it on top of the bandage over his burn. He dipped the fingers of his other hand into the cream and smoothed it over Jill’s palm, rubbing in small circles until the cream soaked into her skin.

“Thanks,” she said quietly.

“Always better when someone who loves you puts it on. So I’m told.” His eyes met hers.

She wet her lips. Then swallowed. “Feels better already.”

“And I made a note about the strawberries,” he added.

“It didn’t even occur to me to say anything.”

“I’ve got you covered from here. I’ll eat your share of all the strawberry shortcake and strawberry pepper jam right along with mine.”

She laughed softly. “My hero.”

His gaze intensified at her words and his voice was husky when he said, “Damn right.”

“We’re here!”

They were interrupted by a woman’s voice calling from the front of the bar.

“Addison! Dana!” Ellie got to her feet, clearly delighted to see the two women who were headed for the back tables.

The women stopped and looked around.

“Darn, I think we missed them,” the brunette said to her friend.

They smiled broadly at one another.

Laughing, Ellie pulled them both into a hug.

“Were you girls sittin’ in your car waiting for your children to leave before comin’ in here?”

The shorter woman with the lighter hair put her hand on her chest and gave a little gasp.

“What? Are you insinuatin’ that we would sit outside, hidden around the corner of your bar, waiting until our gaggle of loud, rambunctious children left to go get stinky and muddy before coming in here where we could drink our liquor in peace?” She waved her hand. “Why I never,” she added with a thick, clearly exaggerated, southern accent.

“I wasn’t insinuatin’ that at all,” Ellie told her. “I was sayin’ exactly that.”

They all laughed.

It was clear from the way the Landrys all greeted the women that they were well known and well liked.

“That’s Gabe’s wife, Addison, and Logan’s wife, Dana,” Zeke filled in for Jill.

“That’s Stella’s mom?”

“Yep.” He grinned. “They’re awesome.”

“Victoria Landry, you get over here with that pretty little girl,” Dana said, motioning to Tori.

Laughing, Tori got up from her seat with Ella. She was enfolded into a group hug as the women include lots of oohs and ahhs over the baby and asked Tori how she was doing as they led her away from the huge group of Landrys to a smaller table a few feet away.

Jill was shocked when, on her way past, Tori snagged her hand and tugged her to her feet.

“Come on. You’re going to be a new mom soon. You have to talk to Dana and Addison with me.”

Jill glanced at Zeke. He was smiling and gave her a little nod.

“They’re great. If you want to go. I think you’ll really like them,” he said.

Jill didn’t know how she felt about anything at the moment, honestly. So, she let Tori pull her toward the table where Dana and Addison had settled.

“I’m assuming you’re gonna want hurricanes?” Ellie asked them.

Addison lifted her long dark hair off the back of her neck and blew out a breath. “Absolutely.” She looked up at Jill with a smile. “Our husbands own a bar in New Orleans. They feel like they make a million hurricanes every week, so they won’t make them at home. But I can’t help it, I love them. So I have ’em every chance I get.”

“And honestly, Ellie’s are way better than Trahan’s anyway,” Dana said. “Don’t tell Logan I said that.”

“So Grace is yours?” Jill asked Dana.

“And a couple others in there too,” Addison said. She looked at Dana. “God, we have a lot of kids.”

“You’re not kidding,” Dana agreed.

“Four each, right?” Jill asked.

“Is that it?” Dana asked. “Feels like eight each.” Both women laughed.

“And I still can’t get enough of babies,” Dana said, reaching for Ella and taking her from Tori. She propped the baby up on her shoulder, patting her back. “Other people’s babies. Logan thinks we need to have another, but I am putting the kibosh on that.”

Addison rolled her eyes. “Sure you are.”

“I swear, if we’re in the same room and that man sneezes, I get pregnant,” Dana said. “But seriously. Four is enough.”

“Four is so many,” Jill said, without thinking.

“Trust me,” Dana said. “It really is some days.”

“I can’t imagine four,” Tori said. She looked at Jill. “We have Landry men, which means almost too much help sometimes, but these two started out on their own. Addison was a single mom in New York when she met Gabe, and Dana’s husband…” Suddenly Tori looked a little ill. “Dammit. I’m so sorry, Dana.”

Dana gave Tori a little smile. “No worries, honey.” She looked at Jill. “My husband was active duty Army. He was killed in action in the Middle East.”

Jill caught her breath. “I’m so sorry.”

“Thank you. It was really hard. And I did do it on my own for a while. In fact, I intended to keep doing it on my own. Until Logan Trahan came along and knocked me up with that smile of his.”

Addison chuckled. “We don’t have to call it his ‘smile’. The kids aren’t around so we can use real grown-up language.”

They all laughed.

“So wait,” Dana said looking at Jill. “You’re with a Landry boy too? Which one?”

Jill nodded and swallowed. “Zeke.”

Dana’s eyes widened. “I love Zeke.”

Shocker. Everyone loved Zeke.

“Yep. We just found out earlier this afternoon that they pulled the Logan and Dana,” Tori said. “They’re having a baby.”

Addison smiled. “Oh, congrats.”

“Thanks.” She didn’t know what else to say.

“She is also the veterinarian who brought the penguins to town,” Naomi said, pulling a chair over to the table, and settling in.

“Hey, Naomi,” Dana said brightly.

Addison gave her a big welcoming smile as well.

“Hey, ladies,” Naomi returned.

“Penguins and a baby. That’s an amazing way to start your new life in Autre,” Addison said to Jill.

“Yeah. That’s one word for it.” Jill’s tone was dry.

Addison chuckled. “Not the word you would use?”

Jill shrugged. “It’s…just a lot.”

“Yeah, it is a lot.”

Addison’s phone dinged and she pulled it out and swiped across the screen. “Clearly we need to stay here and help the new moms with advice.” Addison turned her phone so Dana could see what was on the screen.

Dana groaned.

Addison then turned the phone so the rest of them could see their kids—and their husbands—in the goat pen covered in mud, holding goats, and grinning widely.

“Kids are washable,” Tori said. “That’s what Ellie keeps telling me anyway.”

“You know the only reason that we keep letting them come down here is because you all will let them use your showers before they get back in the car,” Addison said. “There was one time they came down to the petting zoo and didn’t shower before leaving. My car smelled like goats for a week.”

“And I did not know that a group of flamingos is called a flamboyance,” Dana said, reading a text from her phone now. “And no, I do not want to know why I got that text just now.”

“Do you want us to fill you in?” Tori asked.

Dana shook her head. “I’m certain it’s some big wild plan that Stella and Grace came up with, and that Sawyer is enabling, and that includes glitter.”

“Right on all counts,” Tori told her.

Jill felt her eyes widen. “That’s impressive.”

Dana rolled her eyes. “Our kids are loud and wild, but there are some things that are completely predictable…big ideas, Sawyer, and glitter being three of those things.”

Addison crossed her legs, clearly settling in. “We are definitely going to be here for a while. So tell us about you, Jill. You moved here with penguins. We actually heard all about that in the petting zoo’s newsletter. You met and fell for Zeke. None of us are surprised about that. So now what?”

Wow. That really pretty much summed it all up. It sounded a lot simpler than it felt. “I…” She looked at the four women she was sitting with and was suddenly struck by the urge to be completely candid. “I can’t do anything that doesn’t have to do with penguins. I can’t multitask at all. I can’t cook. Like, I can’t even boil an egg without boiling the pan dry. I’ve never changed a diaper or babysat, in spite of the fact that I have two younger siblings. And I’m pretty much freaking out about everything about having this baby.”

None of the women at the table looked particularly shocked by the fact that she was freaked out.

“Why no diapers if you had younger siblings?” Addison finally asked.

“My mom. She was a perfectionist. So she did everything herself.”

“I was a little bit like that,” Addison said. “When Stella was a baby, it was really hard for me to let anyone else in. Actually, even up to the time I met Gabe.”

Jill swallowed. There was something about these women and how they were so open and honest about the fact that their children were handfuls and that they weren’t out there doting on every moment with them at the petting zoo.

“My mom was a doctor,” Jill told them. “Well, she went to medical school. But she got pregnant right after she graduated and my oldest brother had some medical issues when he was a baby. She was too worried to let anyone else stay with him, so she quit and stayed home and proceeded to have three more kids in the next five years.

Dana’s eyes rounded. “Wow, that’s close together.”

“I think that when she had to give up her dream job, she decided that if she couldn’t be the world’s best doctor, then she’d be the world’s best mom and threw herself into that entirely. She did it all herself. And did it wonderfully. One thousand percent.”

“So that means that you didn’t learn to do diapers, or cook, or…” Addison said, clearly letting Jill fill in the blank.

“Anything. I decided to be a penguin expert when I was just a kid. She fully encouraged me to throw myself into my career, I think in part because she didn’t have that. But even when I was young, she encouraged me to have an all-encompassing interest. We never did things like bake cookies together. I never even had chores. Looking back, she was always pushing all of us to get out of the house. We used to joke that it was the only way she could keep it clean, but I really think it was because, while she was so determined to have the perfect house and kids, she resented it and wanted us to have interests in anything but homemaking.”

She looked around the table for reaction to that.

None of the women really gave her one though. They seemed to be just taking the information in. None of them were judging her. No one seemed shocked or appalled.

“It seemed like I had it really easy growing up. While my friends had to help out around the house and watch their younger siblings, all I had to do was…whatever I wanted. It wasn’t until I left home that I realized she really hadn’t helped me out. I didn’t know how to do anything to take care of a home.”

Everyone sat quietly for a moment.

Then Addison said, “You have to come to our support group.”

“Support group?” Jill asked.

“Yeah, that’s actually how we got to know each other.” Dana looked at Addison. “Gabe and I knew each other first. We were both in a single parent support group. Some of us were raising family members, some of us were single parents because of divorce or because we had lost a spouse. But we all came together to support one another. Then, as we started getting married, we all kept getting together. So some of us are still single parents, some of us are married parents, but the truth is, as a parent, you always need support.”

“Yeah, one of the games you have to definitely watch us play is Mine Is Bigger Than Yours,” Addison told her. “We have a big whiteboard, and we all write down the biggest thing we screwed up with our kids since the last meeting. Then, as a group, we rate them from best to worst. And whoever has the worst fuck up gets the traveling trophy.”

“Seriously?” Jill asked.

Addison nodded. “Seriously. We all mess up, all the time, and it’s okay to admit it. And hey, almost everyone walks out knowing that at least one person messed up even bigger than they did.”

“And the one who messed up the most for that week gets to take home the big gold cup filled with chocolate,” Dana said.

“Okay, the chocolate is an important detail,” Tori said.

They all laughed again.

“And then, you can watch us play, I Love Them, But…” Dana told her. “When your kid gets older you can participate too, but I think just watching us play will give you a lot of peace of mind.”

Jill found herself leaning in and resting her elbows on the table. “How do you play that one?”

“We take slips of paper and all write down the asshole things our kids did during the prior two weeks. We fold them up and toss them into a hat. Then we take turns randomly pulling them out and reading them to the group. You drink every time you had something similar happen and felt the same way. It’s kind of like Never Have I Ever…but with the ways your kids are trying to drive you insane.”

“And we end up wasted,” Addison said. “Because we’ve all had all the same stuff happen at some point. Which is the purpose of the game. It’s a safe place to talk about the fact that you love your kids, but they also make you nuts. Then a couple of the husbands come and pick us up and take us all home. And we all leave reassured that our kids are normal-ish and, even better, so are we.”

“And who is watching the kids during this time?” Tori asked, clearly fascinated.

“The dads. Of course, now there’s so many kids, they actually get together and watch them as a group,” Addison said. “It’s the same thing we do when they have their book club night.”

“Your husbands have a book club?” Jill asked.

“Yep. And it’s an erotic romance book club.”

“No way,” Jill said.

“Seriously,” Tori said. “Josh even goes.”

“They actually read romances?” Jill asked.

“Judging by some of the new ideas Logan has brought home, I can attest to the fact that yes, they really do read erotic romances,” Dana said with her hand up as if making a pledge.

All the women laughed. Again. Jill couldn’t remember the last time she’d sat with a group of women her age and enjoyed it this much.

And not talked about penguins the entire time.

“Also,” Addison added, looking at Jill. “We’ll teach you how to boil an egg.”

Jill shook her head. “Honestly, I don’t want to boil eggs.”

Addison shrugged. “Fair enough. But, be warned, we also do school snacks together. If someone has to decorate like four dozen cookies, we all pitch in. Or we brainstorm birthday party ideas or hell, sometimes we fold laundry. All of these never-ending tasks that are simply easier when you have extra hands.”

That was so much like what Ellie had said about extra hands for clean-up, Jill was suddenly choked up. She wouldn’t have the first idea how to decorate four dozen cookies. She’d hire it done, clearly. But someday she was going to have to throw a little boy or little girl a birthday party. She was so screwed.

Except…

She looked at the two women who had literally walked into her life twenty minutes ago. Then at the two women who had been here for six weeks, but who she’d been avoiding because…that was just what she did. And suddenly, she wasn’t feeling quite so in over her head.

They’d done that in twenty minutes.

Imagine how great she would feel after a couple of these moms’ nights with them.

“That sounds really good,” Jill finally said. She looked at Tori. “We’ll both go, right? To the support group?”

Tori nodded enthusiastically. “Absolutely. I can’t wait.”

Addison’s phone dinged with another text and she groaned softly. But she opened the message. Then sat up a little straighter. “Oh, they’re going over to the alpacas with Shay. Jordan’s meeting them down there.” She looked up. “Caleb and Lexi are friends from the group. Their little girl, Shay, has a brain injury from a car accident. Lexi has been talking with Jordan about the new program she’d put together and Lexi’s been so excited to see how Shay reacts when they try some of the activities with the alpacas. I promised to record it since Lexi’s working in the ER tonight.”

“Of course, you should go,” Jill said.

Dana and Addison stood. Dana handed Ella back to Tori and they gave the new mom and Naomi hugs. Then they both smiled at Jill.

“It is really nice to meet you, Jill,” Dana said.

“You too,” Jill said honestly.

“And Zeke will have to come to erotic romance book club,” Addison said with a sly smile.

Jill felt her cheeks heat as her first thought was, Zeke doesn’t need an erotic romance book club for ideas.

Addison noticed her blush and gave her a wink.