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“Hi, sweet girl,” I said, hoping to jog her memory of where she was.
She popped up and looked down at her clothes. A look of great anxiety filled her tiny features. “I slept in my clothes and I did not brush my teeth. How could this happen?”
I guess she didn’t know that the year I’d known her dad he slept in his clothes probably every night. The life of a med student was anything but glamorous.
Jonah reached across me, picked up his little girl, and set her on his lap. “Good morning, Winnie.” He kissed her cheek.
“Father do not, I mean don’t call me that.” She flashed me a sideways grin.
Jonah wasn’t having it. He tickled her. “You will always be my Winnie.”
She giggled. I wasn’t sure she could do that, but it was a beautiful sound. “I am not Winnie,” she protested through her fits of laughter and wiggling.
Jonah stopped tickling her. “I’ll make you a deal. You start calling me Dad again and I won’t call you Winnie anymore.”
I’d wondered when she’d started calling him Father. Her mom probably told her it sounded more commanding. That came off snarky and maybe a little jealous in my head. I honestly didn’t think Eliza was a bad person—perhaps misguided and, let’s be honest, strange—but I think she had good intentions.
Whitney had to stop and think for a moment about Jonah’s proposal. “You promise to never call me that again?”
“I promise.”
“What if I accidentally call you Father?” She sounded like a miniature attorney.
“Then I might accidentally call you Winnie.” He gave her a squeeze.
“Okay,” she sighed “I agree.”
This girl killed me. But I found myself wanting to know everything about her. I wanted to ease her pain.
“We better get home and get you ready for school,” Jonah announced.
Her beautiful eyes widened. “I did not practice using contractions,” she cried. “I cannot, can’t,” she corrected herself, “go to school today. The kids will hate me.” She turned into her dad.
Jonah stroked her hair while his eyes begged me to know what to do.
How should I know? I didn’t have any children of my own and I was a mess myself. But just as I thought that, a memory slammed into me like a wrecking ball. A memory of me as a seven-year-old, wearing the same dirty outfit day after day because we’d run out of money again and we didn’t have a working washer or dryer in the hellhole we were living in. I’d begged my mom not to make me go to school. I had already been teased about wearing the same thing every day and about my greasy hair. All she told me was it was better if I wasn’t at home and I shouldn’t care what anyone said about me. There was no love or sympathy. But I remember being afraid about what she was doing at home while I was gone. I’d seen some strange men come and go, so I went to school for another day of humiliation. I wasn’t going to let that happen to Whitney.
“How would you like to come to work with me today? We’ll work on contractions all day.”
Jonah’s brows raised, as did the corners of his mouth. Maybe I should have asked him if that was all right first, but his facial expression said he could kiss me for it, so I think I was safe in assuming he was okay with it.
Whitney sat up and wiped her eyes. “Will you make me break glass and use a solder iron?”
“Not unless you want to.”
“I do not think I will.”
“That’s okay with me.”
“Can we eat salad with protein for lunch?”
“I think I can manage that.” I smiled.
“Then I will stay with you.” She looked up at Jonah. “We must go home so I can change and get my notebook.” She was the cutest old lady I’d ever known.
Jonah shook his head as if he was astonished at the turn of events. “Okay,” he said, coming out of his daze. “Let’s go home.” He faced me and mouthed, “Thank you.”
We all crawled out of the fort to find Dani and Kinsley, both dressed in flannel PJs, coming out of their shared bedroom and smirking at us.
“Well, good morning,” Dani sing-songed.
“Good morning,” Jonah answered like it wasn’t unusual for two grown adults to come crawling out of a blanket fort with rumpled hair and clothes. He turned to me and pecked me on the lips. “We’ll see you later.”
“Goodbye, Ariana,” Whitney said before taking her dad’s hand and, with her shoes in the other hand, marching him out of the loft like a tiny woman on a mission.
I headed to the kitchen to make coffee. My two best friends followed me, still wearing smirks.
Kinsley leaned across the counter, looking too cute for six in the morning with her blonde hair up in a ponytail. “Sleepovers already?” she purred.
