“Hell yeah,” said Fraoch.
This was the scene that evening: Fraoch on the couch; sometimes with one or both of the boys sitting right beside him, under his arms; a drink in his hand; an endless train of snacks on the table in front of him.
James had the PS4 rolling on the big screen. He and Quentin played Guitar Hero, but when James decided to play Fortnite, Quentin said, “Nah man, that first-person shooter shit is too real. I get my head all fucked-up lost in it.”
Quentin joined Zach, who was at the table researching.
Emma was in and out of the room with little Isla in the sling and then she laid a baby blanket on the floor and put Isla in the middle of it with toys all around. Isla immediately started crawling around, up to the coffee table, pulling herself up to standing, and banging her palms on the surface.
“What’s up girlfriend, you want something to play with?”
I put a teething toy in front of her and she shoved it in her mouth, drool pouring down her arm, the front of her shirt completely damp.
I pretend-gagged. “What’s up, girl? You growing more teeth? I’ve been meaning to talk to you about this look, this whole smearing on yourself thing needs to stop. How you going to be Instagram famous covered in spittle and food?” She giggled at me and made a fwooooooosh noise.
“Good talk.”
She grunted and pooped.
I called, “Beaty! The baby took a shit!”
Emma said, “Hayley, if you live here and you smell it, you have to deal with it. It’s a rule. I have it on the refrigerator.”
Isla turned to Emma, held up her arms and said, “Mama!”
I frowned. “Yeah, you’re right.”
I picked Isla up under the arms, holding her a few inches away from my body, and carried her from the room with Emma following me.
Over the diaper Emma said, “So I saw your face, and I get it — she calls me mama, I don’t know what to do about it.”
I took a deep breath, then shook my head. “There’s nothing to do, you’re the closest thing to a mama she knows. What are you going to do, tell a baby that you’re not her mama, that someday her mama might come home, maybe?”
I closed the tape on the sides of the diaper. “She wouldn’t understand. And Kaitlyn might be back any day now. We’ll just figure it out when it happens.”
Emma said, “Yeah. Yeah of course. She might be.”
Seventy-five - Hayley
When I returned to the living room Fraoch was sitting with Zach and Quentin at the dining room table. Still wearing his sunglasses, he was looking at Zach’s laptop screen.
Fraoch was doing an excellent job of pretending to know what they were talking about. “What year dost ye...?”
Zach said, “This is a record from the day Roderick and Lord Philip attacked Balloch. See there’s Magnus’s name and Kaitlyn’s name and Isla and Archie. Did they tell you they were doing it?”
“Nae, but I think twas tae protect the bairn.”
“Yeah, that’s what Quentin and I think too. This is a good sign, Magnus knows to put them down in the record. He knows. So we’re searching the castle and church records, all around the area, looking for any record of Magnus and Kaitlyn, pre-1557.”
Quentin said, “Balloch castle was built not long before it though, it was the dark ages, there are not enough records.”
“Yeah,” Zach sighed. “Not enough records, but we’re still looking. I don’t want to think about the alternative. I already have to talk to Katie’s mom and dad every other day about what I know — when will they be back? What are we doing to solve this? Em and I are in constant crisis management.”
I got up from the table and walked into the kitchen for some wine. I said over my shoulder, “Or, if this proves Magnus knows to leave records, maybe it also proves he didn’t have time to. Maybe Lady Mairead has already gotten them from the past.”
I got down two wine glasses and filled them with too much wine. “This is good news, right? Lady Mairead got them from the past and is jumping them here, and probably, because she’s a bitch, she’s holding them to bring back at the year mark. And while that is unforgivable, it totally fits her personality. So, it won’t be long.”
The whole time I talked I stared at that glass of wine, the one meant for me. Thinking about how good it would taste, and how thirsty I was, then I took a deep breath and poured it down the sink. I grabbed a can of Coke from the refrigerator and returned to the table. I placed the wine glass in front of Fraoch and popped the top of the Coke for me. “And hey, Zach, let me take Katie’s parents. I’ve been dealing with them my whole life. I can be their liaison from now on.”
Zach said, “That would be really great.”
“You and Emma have enough, she freaking looks like she’s about to pop.”
“Yeah, baby is coming soon.” Zach was distracted because he was clicking on the screen and reading something lengthy. I looked over his shoulder to see a list of baptisms in the year 1523.
“How is this relevant?”
“It’s not, this is me fucking flailing.” He continued scrolling and clicking and opening Wikipedia pages.
“Okay, good. Keep looking is what I’m saying, but also, we should totally be planning their welcome home feast.” I drank another swig of coke.
After a nice late dinner and after the kids were in bed, we sat and talked a little longer. Finally we headed to bed because I declared that day plenty long enough. In bed, washed and brushed and cleaned and in pajamas, I said to Fraoch, “I’m proud of you. You learned a crap-ton of new things today and you barely flinched.”
“Och, I am hidin’ m’astonishment.”
“You’re doing it very well.”
“Good,” he paused. “Ye told me a great deal of it when we were on our rides in Scotland. It all sounded as if it were a story. I believed ye might be makin’ it up, but here we are and tis all true.”
I smiled through the darkness at my husband. “That is so romantic.”
“That I thought ye were tellin’ a story?”
“No, that you listened.”
Seventy-six - Hayley
The next morning after breakfast, James arrived. “Can I borrow Fraoch?”
“Why?”
“I want to take him fishing.”
“Oh, of course.” I held my table knife, menacing. “But no strip clubs. No freaking him out. No instigating sword fights. No telling him about that time in middle school.”
James laughed, “Just fishing. He grew up on a loch, he likes to fish. I’m going to show him my boat. We’ll be back in a few hours.”
Fraoch grinned and stood from his chair. “Dost I need anythin’?”
“Nope I got the rods, the cooler packed, ready to go.”
As they left I called, “Sunscreen, James! He’s from Scotland, make him wear sunscreen!”
Seventy-seven - Kaitlyn
Carrying my bow, I climbed the seventy stairs to the upper part of the castle and found Magnus up on the parapet sitting on the low wall. He had his eyes on the horizon, thinking.