Testing The Waters

Chapter Sixteen

"Anna, you have to stay still," I giggle, grabbing the ankle of the squirming little girl's foot and setting it back down on the towel laid out on the grey carpet of her bedroom. I shake my head, laughing and bring the nail polish brush back to her foot, but the second it touches her toenail, she starts squirming again.

"It tickles!" she laughs, wiggling toes that currently have two poorly painted pink toenails.

I pull the brush away again and give her a chiding grin. "I just need to finish these last three toes and then we're done."

Our little sleepover wasn't planned, but when her dad picked her up from group session this evening, and she asked him if I could spend the night, I kind of got roped into it. It's hard to say no to Anna when she gives you those big, brown eyes of hers.

I remember how much I loved sleepovers when I was her age. Claire and I would have them nearly every week. It makes me sad to think that Anna doesn't have any friends that she can share that experience with.

Anna's attention shifts to my left, and her face lifts up in excitement. "Look at my toes, Al!" Anna says grinning.

My hand pauses on her foot. I glance over my shoulder to find Alex standing in the doorway staring at me, brows bunched in confusion.

"Isn't it a little late for you to be here?" he asks.

He wasn't here when I showed up, overnight bag in tow, so he must just be getting home. Maybe he was on a date.

With Ashley?

I ignore the slight twinge of something—an I don't want to know something—that settles into me at the thought of that.

"We're having a sleepover," Anna answers for me.

"A sleepover?" Alex's brows lift in surprise as his eyes shift from Anna back to me. Instantly, his gaze drops down to my tank top before dipping down to my thin, cotton pajama shorts. His eyes pause on my bare legs as a small frown works its way onto his mouth.

"Yup," Anna replies, hiking up her small foot at him. "Babbie's painting my nails!"

I give him an embarrassed smile. "Not very successfully."

Shifting his eyes back to mine, he stares at me for a moment before the corner of his mouth tips up in a relinquished smile. "That's because she's a little jumping bean. Always has been."

Is that why he calls her Bean?

Alex pushes through the doorway. "When she was a toddler, putting shoes on her was a two-man job," he says, taking a seat behind Anna.

He grabs her and slides her onto his lap, wrapping his arms around her as he blows bubbles on her neck. This causes her to squirm with laughter as her little tongue snakes out over a wide smile. I bite back my own.

I look down at the nail polish bottle in my hand, peeking up at him through my lashes as a slow, unfamiliar warmth begins to fill me.

Things have been different between us since the day of the scooter incident. It's not a blatant difference, but a quiet shifting in our dynamic.

He's quieter. More cautious.

We don't talk a lot, and for the most part, he's been keeping his distance, seemingly content with giving Anna and I our space when I'm over. I'm not sure how to make sense of him, and my brain has never done well with things that don't make sense.

In all honesty, I'm a little unnerved with how much space Alex has been taking up in my head lately. I'm seeing sides of him that barely a month ago I never thought possible.