This Is Us

Chapter 19

"This is ridiculous," I mutter as I stare at myself in the mirror.

At least I think it's myself. I don't recognize her though. This vision looking back at me is someone I've not seen since before Walker was born.

One may hear that and ask what on earth I could possibly mean.

This version of me was laid to rest six years ago. The 'done up' woman pushed aside the extra effort to try and look pretty, using the time it took to just simply take a shower and wash away spit up from her hair. The extra ten minutes to use a blow dryer had been taken over by breastfeeding or pumping so that Walker could eat.

Even as he got older, one would question why I didn't revert back to earlier ways, attempt to make my presence a little more welcoming. That answer is even more difficult to come to terms with, called divorce.

Single parenting a two year old has enough troubles on its own, but toss in autism and the ballgame just become heavily one sided. I only thought I was outnumbered before then.

As Walker got a little older, and only slightly less needy (for lack of a better term), I began to just not care what I looked like. Did that mean I walked around in stained and torn clothing with my hair in a rat's nest? No, of course not. I did have a business to run after all. But, what it did mean is that I just made sure I looked presentable, not as though I was trying to get my son a new dad.

That thought smacks me in the face and I visibly wince, making the mascara wand stab me in the eye.

With my right eye watering, ultimately making what mascara had been applied begin to streak down my cheek, I'm ready to just throw the red tube against the sink and call it quits.

"This isn't out of pity."

The words Chris told not only myself, but my friends, are on repeat in my mind. While I have no reason not to believe him, I also don't have a reason to believe his words are true.

"You only turn twenty-seven once," Ally's words before I'd agreed to such a mistake.

"And I only turned twenty-six, and twenty-five and all the twenties prior once, too," I'd snapped.

Chris had stepped forward at that point. "Wait. Twenty-seven?" I'd nodded at him with my brow creased because why is that such a surprising number to hear. "I didn't realize it was such a special, monumental year," he continued. "Then it's decided. You have to celebrate it."

"Monumental year?" I repeated. "Sixteen, twenty-one, forty, fifty and ever ten years after. Those are monumental. Twenty-seven is just another blip in life, Evans."

He shook his head side to side, a small smile playing on his lips. "Not true."

Then the damn man took it one step too far.

"Walker, come here," he'd called out to my son. The precious boy he is came running over to his new best friend, nearly tripping as he tried to carry the shield with him. "Do you know, today is your mom's birthday, too?" Walker actually met my line of eye sight for a half a second before looking away, "Ma." Chris nodded. "Yeah, it's your mom's birthday and I was wondering if I could ask you a question." He'd thrown in a couple of signs that I had no clue he knew.

What am I saying? I don't know squat about this man.

Chris leveled himself with Walker, blue eyes to blue eyes. With one hand on the little boy's shoulder and the other resting on the shield, he does what I never could've imagined.

"Can I take your mom out on a date?"

To say my eyes became saucers would be an understatement while I feel Ally's elbow nudging me in the ribs. I can't pull my eyes away from the boys in front of me but I know my friend is about to wet herself in giddiness.