Total pages in book: 84
Estimated words: 78340 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 392(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78340 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 392(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
“Owen. I named him after my favorite actor.” She glanced at the baby, but only for a moment. Then she looked away and asked, “You’re going to take care of him, right?”
“I will.”
She nodded, and then she slid behind the wheel of her car and drove away. I watched her go before shifting my gaze to the baby in my arms. He was still chewing the drawstring. I picked up the baby seat and brought it to the porch with me, and then I sat down on the steps and held this little person with both hands.
“Hi, Owen,” I said. “So, I guess I’m your dad.” He just blinked at me, not that I’d expected him to understand.
An odd sense of calm descended on me. Or maybe I was just in shock.
“Let’s see what your mother thought to pack for you. This seems pretty empty.” I pulled the vinyl tote bag closer and unzipped it while being sure to keep a hold of the baby.
The bag ended up containing three diapers, a half-empty canister of formula, a dirty bottle, and Owen’s wrinkled birth certificate. I took out the document and unfolded part of it. The mother’s name was obviously listed as Katherine Wilson, and sure enough, in the space for the baby’s father it said Logan Genardi.
That didn’t prove anything, and I had no idea if Kathy really had been monogamous during our five months as a couple. But right now, it didn’t matter all that much if I was actually the baby’s father. He needed someone to take care of him, and I was all he had. I’d probably do a paternity test down the road just to satisfy my curiosity, but I already knew I was going to do everything I could to make sure this tiny person was okay.
As I awkwardly unfolded the rest of the birth certificate with one hand, I said, “Let’s see when your birthday is.” There it was. On June fifth, he’d be turning a year old. I glanced at the name at the top of the document, and a bark of laughter slipped from me. “I see your mom gave you her last name, and she really did name you after her favorite actor. It’s going to seem weird when I tell people I’m Owen Wilson’s dad.”
Talking to the baby when he clearly didn’t understand me made no sense, but it was keeping me from freaking out, so I kept doing it. “We’re going to have to figure out some stuff real fast, and that might include housing. I live here with my parents.” I nodded at the ranch-style tract house behind me. “They’re not the nicest people, and they’re probably going to be really mad when they find out about you. They have this thing about premarital sex and how it’s a huge, hellfire-level sin. Maybe they’ll warm up to you though, because you’re awfully cute. If not, I’ll need to find us a new place to live. The problem is, I’m kind of broke. I just paid my tuition for spring quarter, and it didn’t leave me with much in the bank.”
The baby sat there on my knee, watching me with those big, brown eyes while I held onto him to make sure he didn’t tip over. He’d dropped the cord from my jacket, which was all wet and slobbery now, and was trying to chew on his fist.
I thought about it and said, “I guess if we get desperate, we can try going to live with my brother Lark in San Francisco. He’s the only member of my family who seems to care about me most of the time, not that I know him very well. Our parents kicked him out when I was a kid, and—well, that’s not a very happy story.”
I scraped up all the optimism I could muster and smiled at the baby. “But maybe my parents will actually surprise me and welcome their first grandchild into the family with open arms, despite the whole born out of wedlock thing. That’d be nice, wouldn’t it?”
It was probably my imagination, but Owen Wilson looked skeptical.
Chapter 1
My entire world could be sharply divided into two halves—before Owen, and after.
Finding out I had a son changed absolutely everything. In the three weeks since he’d come into my life, I’d quit both my jobs, withdrawn from all my classes at UCLA, and moved four hundred miles north, to a city I’d never even visited before. As if learning to take care of a baby wasn’t already a huge adjustment.
We’d barely lasted three days at my parents’ house. To say they’d been awful when they found out I’d had a child out of wedlock was an understatement. Not that it came as a surprise. After all, these were the same people who’d kicked my brother Lark out of the house when I was twelve and he was fifteen, just because they found out he was gay.