The lights flash. "Please, no flashing lights," Zoey says to the reporter. The flashing stops and the presentation continues. Noah and Sharlotte are seated stage right of Zoey. With Sabali on the left of Zoey on the stage. I move to the back of the room, and Theo walks behind me. He's a hundred percent serious about this conversation we need to have after my work. I am committed to trying to keep things as civil as possible, so I ignore him. I lean against the back wall.

Sabali and Zoey are currently second places in the singing contest. Both young women are lending their support to Noah's upcoming Crocker art museum exhibition. The event has made the small press swell overflowing the press room.

The video presentation plays on the screen. My edited video seems to be playing well in the room of stone face reporters. Sabali and Maurice's mother was a music teacher who taught disabled students. She died of breast cancer but her music learning center for disabled students' lives on. Every year the YouTube channel #ForNoah helps with a donation drive to keep the music learning center doors open to those in need. The scholarships to the learning center help disabled students with things like Autism that don't always qualify as getting disability funding for help. Help and early intervention people with autism desperately need. In recent years more arts have been added to the music center, drawing more people in. Thanks to the money from former students like Noah and the profits from the YouTube channel. The video I didn't shoot, but I wish I did is on the screen. Kids running up to Noah and using him as a big jungle gym, singing the song with the rest of the class. The kids laugh and giggle, a few too shy to play, and some in wheelchairs attack play with Noah as a T-Rex. The unexpected happens as the jaded veteran reporters melted by the end of the video.

The room of reporters claps as Sharlotte takes the stage. Sharlotte in a cardigan and glass in full got my shit together in art mode. She invites the reporters to the upcoming show in the new year. She is welcoming and gracious. If there was ever a masterclass on how to work the press, this woman would give over priced master classes. Sabali and Zoey are ushered away by the singing contest host for more interviews. The gaggle of reality TV cameras people put together a sizzle reel for the singing program. The two look unamused at the interruption but follow the reality tv host.

Noah's eyes track his sister and her friend. His big body shifts in the chair. Sharlotte puts a welcoming hand out to him. The cameras click and flash. Noah flinches away from the camera flashes. His sandy hair comes forward, hiding his eyes. His hands move in a pattern. Thumb to forefinger, thumb to the third finger, thumb to pinky, and back again to the start. What's wrong, Noah?

I push off against the back wall and around the side of the pressroom. Theo touches my arm. He points at the door. I look back at Noah, but in the crowded press event, he doesn't see me. I'll let him get this press crap over with and I'll talk to him about it later. I follow Theo out of the back door. Alone in the front hall of the museum. The conversation he seems to badly want to have isn't one I get to instantly have at his leisure while I'm still at work.

I sit down on the ground, back against the wall with Theo looming over me. While I update blogs and get the business of today and prep for next week. It was always like this. My job wasn't a job for Theo. Somehow it was less than no matter what. If he made the stay at home wife money, maybe I could see it was tiring for him. The problem is we were both tired. We both made about the same amount and worked for it. But my job was always less than.

"Theo, if you want to be helpful while I work, you can loom over by that window and block the sun." Ok, it was a passive-aggressive statement. I could have handled the moment better, but bullshit gets to the best of us. Unexpectedly, Theo smiles and moves to block the sun. He chuckled down at me civilly. A tiny bit of warmth moves through his Cuban-American features.

"At least I'm good for something to you," he offered. I smiled back at him.

It was a poor joke, but I took it as him trying. I can work while trying. He looks over my shoulder as I go through the client flies. With my year at Noah's almost done and ten days until Christmas, it's a little weird. It's our first Christmas, not as a family. Even when he had to work overtime at the prison, we got Christmas a little later than normal. But we got it as a family. I pull up a quick picture of the beach on the sailboat with Noah. A shot without me or Noah in it. Just a wonderful California beach. I plan to use it for a background, but Theo smiles at the beach. It's one of those young man expressions that he's just a little too old for. Mischievous with a hint of laughter being held back.

"Do you remember Tulum?" He chuckles, and the laugh finds a way to escape. Tulum, Mexico, our first vacation together before the kids. Before we were married. I joined him in the laugh because the beach looked the same as Tulum. His union had some big vacation deal, and it was before all the vacation bloggers turned Tulum differently. It was more rural but still vacation beautiful in that unfinished way. The beaches were beautiful, the people were kind, and they had wonderful temples. Temple of the God of Wind overlooking all of it to gaze on high to the ocean. The place was enchanting.

"What about Tulum?" My question drips with caution for all my small smiles in answer.

"Azul," he says the word blue in Spanish. Two different men with the same love for blue. Not a small love either, but adoration for blue. Both men couldn't be more different, even in this stilted conversation we are having. It's more than I would have with Noah. No matter how much of a decoder ring I use with him. It's so hard.

In a way, Noah feels younger than me, even though he's older than both Theo and me. He is poised and confident in his workshop. At sea, Noah is the God of everything. But emotionally man-woman relationship-wise. It feels like he's starting off on this grand adventure when it comes to relationships. I'm almost every new thing for him, and it makes me feel more like Mrs. Robinson that Jo-Lee and Eve joke about me being. It's as if I'm despoiling him at every turn. Theo is simply easier to talk to. Easier to meet up with and with less of a decoder ring required.

Memories of Tulum remind me of the Theo I once knew. Dark handsome together and with this great plant for the two of us to spend the rest of our lives together. Even though it's ash now, I don't think I will ever stop mourning the man he was. Singing Azul out into the dark night wind. The Spanish song flowing into the waves and being caught and pushed back to the beach. Tulum was such a wonderful beginning for us.

"Azul," I say back to him and sink all the memories into it. I make peace with it because I'm unwilling to spit on everything we had together. I don't want to get into the habit of doing that. I won't fake like we didn't have good times.

Beep. You have one new unread message.

Jo-Lee's daughter Bonabell is babysitting. She sent a picture of the kids playing at Noah's and Zoey's house. Their shared room filled with space paintings in a brand new solar system. Bonabell dressed up for the space adventure with them in makeshift Star Wars robes. I laugh-out-loud at the picture, it's like Van Gogh did set design for star wars.

Theo's one imperial eyebrow comes up. It's swarthy, like old times. Good old times and I pass him my tablet. He laughs at the picture.

"It reminds me of Sim's room at the old house." he pauses. His laughter bleeds away. "When did you do the paintings?"

"Yes, space girl and little man are in their element. I painted it the day I picked them up from school when you dropped them off. We did it together. The framed paintings can move. It's a bit of something she can always have, no matter what. We have extras that didn't fit in the space." I offered, biting my inner cheek, waiting for the rejection. He passes me back the tablet and I get back to work. "It would look nice in their bedroom at your place."

"They aren't sharing. They each have their own room," he replied. I've never visited the new house. Seeing it would make it more real. Normally, I ask the kids if anything happens and if they had fun. That's about it. A hundred question play-by-play isn't needed and seems intrusive. When the kids are super excited or something very nice happens, they do naturally give a play-by-play. Or something they didn't like at all. That is when the play by plays comes out.

"Oh," answered.

"Thank you. It would be nice in their bedrooms. It's better than the ones you two painted at the old house." He chides me playfully. Warmth wrapped around every word. The memory of Sim's old room always seems to bring me to a good headspace. Space Girl was in love with that room the second we painted it.

"Well, Noah is an artist, and he helped. It was one of his casual masterpieces, fixing my awful work. Thankfully, Sim is more of an Artist than I ever will be." I grin up at him, letting him into my self-deprecating thoughts with the best of them. But when Theo looked back at me, his good looks were still filled with warmth. But something behind his eyes changed. Something intangible was starting to slip away. It still was there, but it was like watching sand draining from an hourglass.

The door to the press room opens. Reports leave from the press event. Theo's hand extends down to me, and I take him. The cobwebs of our marriage making the move automatic. He easily pulls me up, and I realize this is the first time I've touched this man in almost a year. I released it. Block my mind from having a whole host of different thoughts and emotions that would lead me to a spiral of self-examination overthinking.

Walking past Theo into the press room. But the room is empty. No Noah. I search for a sign of him and see the open back door to the event. I head for it and down the hallway. Theo follows behind me, still waiting for his conversation.

A/n We have something coming up next time. It's not a brownie but you will get two chapters within 24 hours. 

As always thank you so much for the support!

Omg, we number 1 in #BrockOHurn my life is complete. lol.