Words matter, and sometimes context can make all the difference in the world.

“When you talk to Janet, you have to think about not just what’s true, but how the truth will look in black-and-white. Okay?”

She nods and I pull her in against me. I kiss the anxiety on her forehead, then whisper, “Don’t worry. Everything is fine.”

She squeezes her arms around me and nods against my chest.

We step apart as Janet comes out, wheeling Rory in a hospital-policy-mandated wheelchair. “We’re all set.” She smiles.

A nurse comes up and gives Chelsea his discharge instructions and pain medication. Out on the sidewalk, Rory stands, saying he can walk to the car.

Janet shields her eyes from the glaring afternoon sun. “I’ll be stopping by the house one day this week, okay, Chelsea?”

“That’s fine,” Chelsea replies. “I’ll be there.”

“It was nice meeting you, Janet,” I offer just for pleasantries’ sake.

“Same here, Mr. Becker.”

Rory is between me and Chelsea and we walk to the car, her arm around his lower back, my hand on his shoulder, just in case he stumbles. And even though I don’t look back, I feel Janet’s eyes on the three of us the whole way.

• • •

Over the next few weeks, Chelsea and I settle into a weird domesticated arrangement. After work, I swing by the house to help her with the kids, hang out, and do whatever needs doing. Then, after the kids are in bed, Chelsea and I . . . hang out together . . . more often than not without clothes.

The sex has been . . . fucking intense. Quiet—so as not to wake the cockblocking interrupters who are all too eager to disturb us—but still top-notch. It’s a different situation for me—new—but strangely comfortable. I haven’t really let myself think about it too deeply. No labels or discussions or any shit like that. They say ignorance is bliss . . . and my nights with Chelsea have certainly been that.

For now, that’s good enough.

And the kids are a fucking riot. Like a funny, sometimes adorable, sometimes ass-pain-causing fungus, they’ve grown on me. One time, after work, Chelsea needed me to take Rosaleen to her piano lesson. And I did, but . . . it didn’t end well:

“We need to add a piano teacher to the list,” Rosaleen tells her aunt as we walk into the kitchen.

The TV is blaring in the next room, where Raymond and Rory engage in Mortal Kombat—the video game—but from the sounds of it, they may actually be on the verge of beating the shit out of each other. Ronan rocks quietly in his swing while Regan busies herself with pots, pans, and wooden spoons strewn like landmines across the floor. A big metal pot boils on the stove, giving off a warm, beefy aroma.

Chelsea looks up from the cutting board, where a half-chopped carrot lies in wait. “What do you mean? You have a piano teacher.”

“Not anymore.” The seven-year-old shrugs.

Chelsea turns suspicious eyes on me.

And I have no guilt at all. “That guy shouldn’t be teaching children. Sadistic son of a bitch.”

Chelsea places the knife down beside the carrot. Then she takes a deep breath, and I know she’s trying not to stress. “Monsieur Jacques La Rue is the best piano instructor in the city. It took months for Rachel to get him to take Rosaleen as his student. What happened?”

I pop a slice of carrot in my mouth. “What kind of guy makes his students call him Monsieur? He’s probably not even French,” I grumble. “I bet his real name is Joey Lawrence from the Bronx.”

Rosaleen climbs onto the island stool across from her aunt and eagerly tells the tale. “He hit my knuckles with the ruler ’cause I messed up.”

“Exhibit A,” I interrupt. “What kind of sick fuck could hit her?” I motion to Rosaleen’s joyously precious face. “Rory? He’s another story. Her? No way.”

Rosaleen continues. “So Jake went out to his car and came back in with a baseball bat. Monsieur La Rue asked him what he was doing and Jake told him, ‘You hit that kid’s knuckles again, I’m gonna hit you with this.’ ”

Chelsea turns to me, her head tilted and jaw slack.

I admit nothing.

“So . . . he fired us,” Rosaleen concludes.

I nudge her with my elbow and offer her a carrot. “We fired him.”

She pops it in her mouth with a smile.

Chelsea watches our exchange and her face softens. “Okay. New piano teacher. I’ll add it to the list.”

Another time, the older kids had dentist appointments that conflicted with Regan and Ronan’s Mommy and Me playtime. Like I’ve said before, I fucking hate doctors—and dentists are just doctors for teeth. So I opted to take the little kids to their class. I mean, they’re babies—how hard could it be?

Children are everywhere, all shapes and sizes, some climbing, some stumbling, some—like Ronan—getting their “tummy time” on the floor as they try to master crawling. And the parents—Jesus, they’re like a frighteningly uptight, Stepford-wife smiling, cooing religious cult armed with cameras. The Mommy and Me playroom is obnoxiously colorful—a rainbow rug, neon slides, blaring padded wedges, and mats that hurt my eyes if I look at them too long. Freakily cheerful music pours from mounted speakers with a forcefully happy teenager in a fuchsia T-shirt running the show.

And don’t get me started on the clowns.

They’re painted on the walls, marionette versions line the shelves, and stuffed ones with eerily wide-spread arms fill the corners, their red-rimmed, white-teethed mouths opened in the creepiest fucking grins I’ve ever seen. Like they’re just waiting for an unsuspecting kid to wander by so they can bite their heads off.