Now, as she watched her daughter, this amazing and exuberant kid who had suddenly blossomed into a confident young woman right before her eyes, she felt her chest tighten. She had anticipated this moment, so why did it feel as though it was happening too soon?
“Hi. You look nice tonight.”
She hadn’t seen Jonathan make his way across the gym, but she smiled up at him, happy for the distraction. He always looked good but tonight, in black jeans with a black turtleneck pullover under a charcoal jacket, he sort of took her breath away.
“So do you,” she said.
“Trying to look like an authority figure. Is it working?”
He looked like a movie star. “I’m sure all these kids will take one look at you and be on their best behavior.”
He laughed at that. “Then mission accomplished.” She watched him search out his daughter. “How long did it take the girls to get ready?”
“The better part of an hour, and that included several trips between your place and mine to figure out what they were going to wear. Kate even convinced my daughter to lose the ponytail and experiment with a little makeup. They both look great, don’t you think?”
She glanced up and watched Jonathan watching them. “They do,” he said. “The boys seem to think so, too.”
It hadn’t escaped her that right after Casey and Kate met up with Alycia at one of the tables, three boys joined them. Henry she already knew, and she was still trying to adjust to how much he’d changed over the summer. Thanks to a major growth spurt, he was now as tall as Casey. Sarah was willing to guess the other boys were Brody and Dexter. From listening to Casey and Kate, she knew Alycia and Brody were already an item, and it was clear that Henry had a thing for Kate. That left Dexter and her daughter. He was only slightly taller than Casey, which might account for her daughter’s reluctance to wear heels. He was a nice-looking boy, dressed in jeans and a leather jacket that were probably meant to make him look less clean-cut than he clearly was.
“I have a feeling the next few years won’t be easy ones,” Sarah said.
Jonathan sighed. “I did not need to hear that.”
Sarah smiled. “They’re smart girls. As long as they know we trust them, and as long we keep the lines of communication open—”
“Communication,” he repeated. “I think I’m finally starting to get the hang of it.”
“How have things been with you and Kate? The two of you seemed fine over dinner.” Kate had jokingly suggested he needed an apron after he sampled the spaghetti sauce and dribbled some down the front of his T-shirt, and he had affectionately pointed out that she was on laundry duty this weekend.
“Considering how it started, it’s been an okay week. She’s already caught up on homework assignments, and she got a C-plus on an English essay she turned in yesterday. And she talks nonstop about helping out at your store, so thank you again for giving her that opportunity.”
It was almost impossible to believe that less than a week ago he’d been so angry when he found out Kate had been coming to the store behind his back.
“No need to thank me. She’s a big help around the store, great with customers. I’d like to talk to you about putting her on my payroll—fourteen-year-olds are allowed to have part-time jobs as long as they have a parent’s permission, and there’s a little paperwork that needs to be done—but I didn’t want to mention it at dinner tonight in case you want to think it over.” Or say no altogether, which was his prerogative although she hoped he wouldn’t exercise it.
“I think it’s a great idea.”
She hadn’t expected such a quick response. “Thank you. Would you like to tell her?”
“No, I think you should. It’ll mean more if she hears it from you.”
“All right, but I’m still going to insist that she ask for your permission.”
“Thanks. I appreciate that.”
In the flickering light, his eyes went from dark to blue and dark again, and for a second or two she almost forgot what they were talking about.
“Kate told me about the talk you had with her yesterday,” he said. “About the education she’ll need to work for a magazine.”
“Landing a job with a big magazine will take hard work and commitment, not to mention a good education.”
“And she took everything you said to heart. Over dinner last night she told me she’s going to look into colleges that have a journalism program. I sure wasn’t expecting that.”
Sarah was pleasantly surprised, too.
The music cut out then while the student council president, a senior who Sarah recognized as one of her customers, took the microphone and welcomed the freshmen to Serenity Bay High and then went on to describe some of the prizes that would be given out that evening. “But,” she said, “you have to be on the dance floor to have a chance of winning!”