Flower Girl Bride by Dana Corbit

was referring to me, but at least he hadn’t singled me out.
    â€œI’m sorry. I shouldn’t have…” I let my words trail off because we both knew what I shouldn’t have said.
    He nodded as if to acknowledge my apology. “But it gets even worse,” he continued. “Now I not only have parents offering me their gems of experience, I’m supposed to be grateful when I get tips from people who don’t even have kids.”
    Again he didn’t name me. He didn’t have to. He was right. Whether or not he’d messed up tonight—and I still was convinced he had—I had no business making assumptions about his whole life with his son. Justbecause I’d seen some examples of poor parenting at my school didn’t mean I knew anything about Luke and Sam.
    â€œReally, Luke, forgive me. I had no right.”
    Luke just raised his hand to stop me and stepped past me into the great room. “I’m the one who gets him up every morning and puts him to bed every night,” he said without looking back. “I know that Sam would rather take a long walk off a short pier than eat his green beans and that he prefers to sleep with a monkey named Sunshine.”
    â€œSunshine?”
    He turned to face me, looking more tired now than angry. “It’s just this stuffed monkey with matted gray fur. A real eyesore.”
    â€œI thought he was talking about missing the sun outside, not a toy named Sunshine.” I shook my head, finally laughing at myself when I should have been chortling all along instead of taking myself so seriously.
    â€œYou see what I mean? I’m Sam’s dad. I know him. I know the important things, like that he’s afraid of the dark and daddy longlegs and that he has accidents if he doesn’t go to the bathroom right before—”
    â€œOh, my gracious,” I interrupted him, already rushing for the stairs.
    â€œLet me guess. He talked you into letting him get a drink.”
    I’d climbed the first few steps, but I turned back to him, frowning. “No. Two.”
    â€œWell, better join Noah and the animals in the ark because another great flood is coming.”
    Â 
    As it turned out, there was no sign of a second Noah or any animals traveling two by two. Sam wasn’t even in his bed when I reached his room at a flat-out run. He’d made it back to the bed, given fair warning by my herd-of-buffalo approach, but the boy just couldn’t manage to scramble under the covers before I threw the door wide.
    I flipped on the light, crossed my arms and drew my eyebrows together, waiting.
    â€œDid Daddy come?” His gaze darted to the side as he said it.
    â€œYou know he did, Sam.” I didn’t add you little stinker to my comment, but I was too busy trying to replay my conversation with Luke. What had we said that might permanently damage a child? Some of it had stung even my pride, and I was technically an adult.
    â€œI’m here, buddy.” Luke said from behind me. He didn’t bother to call Sam on his stretch of the truth, and he didn’t apologize for anything his son might have overheard, either. “It’s late, though. You need to go to the bathroom, and then we need to get home.”
    Funny, I don’t know why, but I expected Sam to balk, to beg to stay another night and spend another day playing with me. So it surprised as much as stung me when he stood up on the bed and held out his arms for his father to take him. In three long strides, Luke was with him, but instead of lifting him immediately, Luke tugged at the sleeve of the oversize T-shirt, covered in tie-dyed frogs.
    He glanced back at me. “Where are his clothes?”
    â€œI washed them. You can take that home and return it later.”
    â€œThat’s all right. Where are his things now?”
    â€œIn the dryer. I’ll get them.” I hurried from the room as if he was chasing me. I didn’t