Page 22 of A Lot Like Lavender

She giggles. “Don’t steal my joy, Em. They’re adorable together.”

“Never.” I pull myself away from Pam to hug Dinah and take Lola from her arms. “I’m glad you’re here, Dinah Belle. And you, too, little Lola.”

“I love your brand of crazy,” Dinah says, rubbing a hand up and down my back, just a woman casually soothing her senile elderly sister. And I obviously don’t blame her. I know I talked a big talk about moving Pam into the house, but I surprised even myself when I brought her in early this morning with very little thought on the matter.

Thoughts like,will she fit?

Yes. All the praise hands.

Will your daughter ask if the entire herd can come in?

You betcha.

Will the man that you did not expect or invite to take up residence on your farm shake his head every time he passes the window of said alpaca room like he thinks you’re insane?

One hundred percent.

What will you do with her poop?

TBD.

Lola gives me a slobbery, open-mouth, toddler kiss that momentarily heals a tiny piece of my heart, but that feeling is fleeting asDr. Can’t-Take-a-Hintwalks across Dinah’s field ofvision on his way to mend the fence line that I absolutely did not ask him to mend, shaking his head again in disapproval at likely all my life’s decisions. Dinah gasps, runs to the window and points, shouting loud enough for Jordan to stop in his tracks for a pause that tells me there’s no doubt he’s heard her.

“What is a man doing on your lawn?!”

Her enthusiastic disbelief over the man on my property versus the presence of an alpaca in my home feels disproportionate and, quite frankly, a little offensive.

“He won’t leave,” I snip, also loud enough for him to hear. Unfortunately, Molly—who’s been following Jordan around the yard like a baby duck for days—does, too. She glares at me as she trots behind him. Turns out, my daughter’s alliances are fickle at best and have clearly shifted.

“Mooomm.” She shakes her head—a lot like the man she’s emulating, actually—with all the disappointment a nine-year-old can muster for the woman who birthed her but also needs to be fed dinner by that same woman in about twenty minutes. She chases Jordan after what, I’m assuming, Molly believes to be a respectable length of time for me to feel her displeasure.

I’ve used every excuse I can muster to explain to Molly why I don’t want her newbffworking on our home.

He has a job. A life. He is very busy. Boys smell.

All to no avail. Because, though he hasn’t looked in on Pam again after I specifically asked for Dr. Rafferty, Jordan has shown up at the crack of dawn every day since, working through nightfall on odd jobs he’s found around the farm. Fixing my porch steps, the railing, securing the hayloft of the barn, mending fences…

He just keeps coming back, and I’m honestly not sure he’s even leaving the farm at night when he’s done. TheJordan I knew was never a quitter, so I wouldn’t be surprised if he’d been secretly sleeping next to Pamela in the barn the last two nights, then disappearing on my property to do odd jobs before I arrived for morning chores. But the Jordan I knew also swore he’d be a cardiologist, that he wanted a hobby farm next to ours, and that he couldn’t wait to meet our daughter, yet none of those things turned out to be true.

Dinah barely notices my annoyance, gushing like she’s a teenager again. “Oh my gosh. That’s Jordan Love! THAT IS JORDAN LOVE?” She’s pointing again, with her nose smushed to the window for a better vantage point. “You have got to get better at using descriptive language, Em. You really need to come to book club or at least read one romance. Just one.”

She points her finger into the air but doesn’t take her eyes off the man now giving my daughter a piggy back ride through the pasture on his way to the fence line with a small herd of female alpacas following him. “Finely chiseled jaw. Eight feet tall. Muscled, tattooed forearms… and glasses! The man wears glasses now, Em… all while being pals with your daughter. You undersold it all. He’s the definition of a perfect MMC.”

“He’s… barely tolerable,” I lie, quoting my sister’s favorite movie. I’d have to be blind not to notice the fact that Jordan is, by all respects, nice to look at. He did have the entire PTA chattering about him after all, so it isn’t a secret he’s considered kind of beautiful. Objectively speaking. And the fact that he’s quickly fallen in love with my child does indeed endear him to me a teensy portion.

“He’s also still the guy that I once witnessed eat a slug for a ten dollar bet. Who, in college, overdrafted his bank account on cheap tacos. And, who disappeared from my lifewhen I was pregnant and newly widowed… so… forgive me if I don’t care much about his jawline.”

Dinah grunts, tapping her forehead against the window a few times, earning a couple cheap chuckles from Lola. Pam, however, has lain down in her corner of the room, unamused by my sister’s dramatics.

“A beautiful man from your past has shown back up into your life, clearly loves your kid, and is helping you on your farm. In eighty-degree, musty, Georgia weather. There are bugs out there, Emory. Bugs! The girls even like him. Look.”

We both gaze out the window as Kelly and Meredith meander as close to Molly and Jordan as possible. Kelly even goes as far as nudging her dark, furry face into Jordan’s side until he relents, chuckling and rubbing a hand down the length of her neck. Molly looks as if she’s talking his ear off from where Jordan holds her on his shoulders.

“You know Kelly and Mer have never been good judges of character. Remember when they buddied up to that delivery kid who peed in my front yard.”

“Emory, Grayson Baker did not pee in your yard.”

“He did!” I give her a little shove with my hip. “You know he did. Right next to the barn. And he didn’t wash his hands either. I threw that pizza out so fast.”