Believe Me, I'm Lying

“Does that toy go there? No, it doesn’t. Put it where it’s supposed to go.”

“But I like it here!” Devyn whines, throwing the toy truck back onto the floor.

“Devyn,” Alex grips onto his arm, bending down and looking him in the eyes. He knows the beginnings of a temper tantrum when he sees one. “You have to put the toy away. I’m cleaning up because we have someone coming over and I want the place to be clean. So please pick the toy up and put it in the toy box.”

The four year old shakes his head and crosses his arms over his chest. “No.”

“Devyn-”

“No!”

Alex sighs, rubbing his hands over his face. He doesn’t have time for this. “Fine. Leave the toy there. You’re going in your room.”

He stands up and takes Devyn by the hand, pulling him as gently as possible over to his bedroom door. He opens it and flips the lights on, pointing to his bed. “Go sit on your bed until I come and get you. Okay?”

Devyn shakes his head again pulling his arm out of Alex’s grip. “I don’t wanna! I wanna watch TV.”

“Devyn, that’s it. You’re not watching TV at all tonight. Until you can act nicely and put your toys away when I ask, there’s no TV.”

Devyn’s bottom lip trembles. “I hate you!”

Alex freezes with his hand on the doorknob. Devyn’s never said that to him before, and it fucking hurts. He figured he’d have to hear those words from him at some point – what kid doesn’t say that to their parents eventually along the line? But it hurts a lot more than he thought it would. Devyn turns his back to him and climbs up onto his bed, facing towards the wall. Alex isn’t really sure exactly what to respond to that, so instead of saying anything he just shuts the door and walks back into his kitchen, trying his best not to get more upset than he is already.

He cleans up the rest of the apartment quickly, making sure to pick up every single toy and that there’s no dust on any of the tables. He doesn’t need Nicole coming in and criticizing him for not keeping his place clean. She’s got enough of an advantage over him already.

As far as Devyn’s little temper tantrum is concerned, Alex figures he’ll talk to Zack later after Nicole leaves. Zack grew up with two younger sisters – he has more knowledge about toddlers than Alex and Rian do. And maybe Jack would know what to do.

Nicole gets to the apartment at three on the dot, knocking softly on the front door. Taking a deep breath, Alex prepares himself for the worst. He’s not sure if she’s showing up by herself, or with a new boyfriend, or even a lawyer or something. But when he actually opens the door, he just sees her. She’s standing there with a small smile on her face, looking just like Alex remembers. Her hair is still blonde and she’s still as short as ever. She’s wearing a blazer over a white shirt paired with black pants, making Alex wonder where she’s come from.

“Hi, Alex,” She says softly, lifting her hand for a small wave. “I’m sorry that I’ve just kind of… turned up so randomly.”

“It’s okay, really. Um. You wanna come in?”

“Sure. Thanks.”

Alex steps aside, offering to take her jacket and she hands it over along with her bag and Alex isn’t blind – he sees the thick packet of papers sticking out of it. He just wonders what they’re for.

“So um. How’ve you been? Your grandparents didn’t exactly seem to keen on telling me much,” She says, sitting down at the kitchen table. “Do you still talk to them?”

“No… I don’t talk to them at all and neither does my brother. I moved out like… a few weeks after you went to school. They’re not very big fans of the fact that I kept Devyn.”

She nods once, mouthing an ‘oh’ before crossing her arms and leaning on the table. “Is…is he here? Or does he go to preschool or…?”

“He won’t start preschool until next fall. He’s in his room right now, though. He was sort of in time out.”

“Oh. Well whenever his time out is done, maybe I could see him?”

Alex nods, tapping his fingers on the table top. “Definitely. I just…don’t exactly know how he’s going to react to you. To be honest, you’re the first woman to come to the apartment in a long time.”

He watches as she nods again and glances around the room. He hopes she’s not here to analyze his living situation and report back to a lawyer of some sort. So far, she seems like she’s just here to see Devyn. But he can’t let himself be caught off guard. So he coughs to grab her attention again and offers a warmer smile. “What have you been up to, then?”

Her eyes light up, clearly eager to talk about how she’s been. “I’ve been pretty good…I graduated from the pre-med program a bit early and I’m going to med-school at New York University so, I’m pretty excited about that,” She gushes, unable to keep the smile off her face. “My boyfriend lives in the city so I’ll live with him and go to class. It’s exciting.”

“That’s awesome,” Alex says, and he’s not lying. He’s happy for her. He’s glad that she’s doing what she always set out to do. “How long have you been with him?”

“Three years. I met him at school. Are you seeing anyone…?”

The way she looks at him, Alex can tell she hasn’t forgotten that little fact that he likes men. “Well, I am, but it’s kind of complicated at the moment so…”

“Okay. You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t really want to. I realize that showing up here like I did is probably throwing your daily routine off and whatever.”

“Well…To be honest, I was a little surprised that you came back,” Alex admits. “I thought when you left, that was it. I just… don’t understand why you’re back all of a sudden…”

Nicole leans back in her seat, placing her hands flat on the table and letting out a deep breath. “Well. I’m not going to lie and say that I thought about you a lot after I left. I sort of pushed you to the back of my mind. But my boyfriend…when I told him about you and Devyn, he kept telling me that it’d be good for me to come back and see you and form a relationship with Devyn. He um. He wants me to try and get full custody of him because he says that I’ll regret not being a mother to him. And I… I agree with him.” She bites her lip, waiting for Alex’s response.

Alex shuts his eyes and lets out the breath he was unknowingly holding and then locks eyes with her, not really sure what to say. “Nicole… That’s a lot to ask of me after being out of my life for four years. You realize that, right?”

“I knew you weren’t going to be a very big fan of that idea… But you must know that if we were to go to court over this… I would have some advantages…Right?”

She’s suddenly gone from sweet and caring to blunt and fairly insensitive in a matter of seconds and it throws Alex for a second. He nods dumbly, not quite sure what to make of her anymore. “I do know that,” he eventually tells her. “But you also have to know that, if it came to a court case, the court would see that you have absolutely no relationship with Devyn. That wouldn’t really look good on your part.”

“That’s why I’m here, Alex. To see Devyn and form a relationship with him. And if we can’t settle an agreement on our own, with just a lawyer, then we’re going to go to court… I’m sorry but… It’s just something that I’ve got to do, you know?”

“No, I don’t know. But I’m not going to just let you take him from me. I’ve raised him for four years on my own. I’m not losing him.”

Her facial expression remains unfazed as she asks, “Can I see him?”

As reluctant as he is to say yes, Alex knows that he can’t say no. So he just nods and stands up from the table, telling her to wait there while he went and got Devyn. Thankfully she listens to him and doesn’t try and protest.

Devyn’s still on his bed, exactly where Alex left him earlier. He’s not sure if the four year old remembers what he said to Alex or if he’s still in a bad mood, but judging from the fact that he’s rolling a few toy cars across his bedspread, Alex is going to guess that he’s alright now.

“Devyn, there’s someone in the kitchen that wants to meet you. Are you going to be nice and come out and talk to her?”

He stares back at Alex and for a second Alex thinks he’s going to say no and they’ll be right back to where they were before. It’s not often that Devyn throws tantrums but when he does, they tend to last for most of the day. However, he simply shrugs and clumsily climbs down from his bed, walking over to Alex and reaching his arms up.

“Up,” he says, tugging on the hem of Alex’s shirt.

Alex bends down instead, placing Devyn’s hands by his sides. He figures that he should address the issue now, while Devyn is calm and while the incident is still slightly fresh in his mind. “Can we talk for a second first? About what happened earlier? You know it wasn’t nice to throw the toys on the ground, don’t you?”

The four year old avoids meeting Alex’s eyes as he nods, his fingers moving to cover his mouth.

“And what you said to me, it wasn’t nice either. ‘Hate’ isn’t a nice word. You made me feel sad. And you don’t want that, right? Being sad isn’t very fun.”

“No…”

“So what do we say when we do something not very nice?”

“Sorry.”

Knowing that right now, that’s the best he’s going to get out of him, Alex takes it and stands up, bringing Devyn with him. He doesn’t want to keep Nicole waiting too long – he doesn’t want to risk pissing her off.

Her eyes light up again when she sees Devyn. It’s not surprising to Alex, really. Devyn’s the cutest four year old he’s ever met. Okay, maybe he’s biased. Whatever.

“He looks just like you,” She says softly as she stands up from the table and moves closer to them. “Oh my God, it’s almost scary.”

“That’s what everyone says, yeah.”

“Wow. I… I’m sorry; this is kind of overwhelming, if I’m honest.” She’s got her hand over her mouth, staring at Devyn with wide eyes. He looks back at her, not exactly with interest but not disinterested either. He’s just sort of observing, Alex guesses, which is strange because Devyn has never been one to be observant.

“Can I hold him?”

“Sure… I guess.”

Devyn still seems unfazed when he’s passed from Alex to Nicole. It’s weird for him to be so quiet, but Alex thinks it’s probably because of the little scene he had earlier. It probably tired him out.

“Hi Devyn,” Nicole says in a sickly sweet voice. Alex doesn’t like the way she adjusts to holding him so easily. He was hoping she’d not know how, or something. But she seems like a natural.

Before long, the time creeps past four and Nicole is sitting on the floor of the living room, trying to get Devyn to play with her. Alex is leaning against the counter, secretly happy to see that Devyn doesn’t seem interested in playing with her in the slightest. He hopes that’s a good sign for the future.

“I don’t really want to be rude or anything,” He says, walking towards the living room, “but I kind of have some things planned and-”

Nicole laughs, interrupting him. “You want me to leave. I get it. I should be going now anyway. I have a flight back to New York at nine.”

“Wait…You’re flying back to New York?”

“For a few days, yeah. I want to talk to my lawyer about a few things. I’ll be back soon, though.”

“Oh. Well okay then… Keep in touch, I guess.”

“I will. You’ll hear from me again soon.” She bends down and presses a kiss to Devyn’s head and that small little action makes Alex’s stomach turn and his blood boil with anger. “Thanks for letting me stop by.”

“No problem,” Alex says shortly, opening his front door as she pulls on her jacket.

The second she’s out the door, he slams it shut behind her, locking it and pressing his back up against it. He slides down a bit, breathing out and feeling his nerves calm down a little bit. He’s not losing his son to her. He refuses. It’s not happening.

With that mindset, he thinks about Jack and how he’s supposed to be breaking up with Ashley over the next two days. Soon, Jack will be free to be with him and they can find a new apartment and together they can prove to anyone who doubts them that Devyn’s better off living with them than with his mother.