AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Every baby is not even close to being the same. One-year-old Winona kicks my back and has already tried to unbuckle herself by rattling the straps. Daisy keeps an eye on her while our seven-year-old races out ahead of us. Sulli’s determined to push her pace to the limit.
Winona knees my spine.
“Fuck,” I curse.
Daisy smiles. “Need to trade?” She wears a dark green pack with our camping gear.
“Depends, Calloway.”
“On what?”
“Whether or not you plan to fall fucking down.” She usually skips around, not paying attention, and she’s face-planted on the dirt four times already. Her hands are cut up, but if you saw Daisy, so carefree, you’d hardly notice.
“Me? I don’t fall.”
“Then what happened ten minutes ago?”
“I gracefully lied down.”
She makes me fucking smile, and I smack the rim of her baseball cap, shielding her eyes. She’s made me laugh four times today—and fuck, after everything, that funeral…I shake my head in thought.
There’s nowhere I’d rather be than in the woods, on a mountain, with Daisy Meadows.
With Sullivan Meadows.
With Winona Meadows.
With my fucking girls. My family.
Daisy calls out, “Go right, Sulli! Follow the red stakes.” We marked out a trail about five or six years ago. Sulli veers to the right, a little red-faced and sweaty as the elevation increases. We can’t always include Sulli in everything. A lot is still too dangerous. Like riding a motorcycle. Like jumping off fucking cliffs in foreign countries. When we do say yes, you can, she goes after the task like it’s her only chance.
So she hikes like this is the first and last time she’ll feel her soles on this mountain.
Daisy spins her hat backwards while Winona babbles incoherent fucking things. My wife elbows my side and screws open her water bottle. “Guess what?”
“What?” Every step higher, I feel fucking stronger.
“You have a little animal on your back.”
Winona giggles like she’s up to no good.
“That so?” I crane my head, meeting Winona’s big brown eyes, flecked with hazel.
She kicks her feet and shrieks happily, “Daddy!”
She’s fucking cute. I reach behind me and tenderly rub her head. She holds onto my finger for a minute or two before letting go. Daisy watches us with the most loving smile while sipping her water bottle.
“Hey, sweetheart?” I wait for her eyes to land on mine. “We made that fucking baby.”
“I thought she looked a lot like you.” She smiles into another sip of water. “I wasn’t sure for a while there.”
“Yeah?” I take the bait. Winona has my eyes, but she looks a lot more like Dais. “There were other men who could’ve been her dad?”
“Tons,” she jokes. “About a billion.”
“You fucked a billion men, Calloway?” We didn’t have sex to have Winona, but I’m being about as serious as Dais is right now.
“A billion and one men.”
I don’t crack a smile, which only makes hers grow. I scan her in a long once-over and then raise my brows up at Daisy. “Bullshit.”
She smiles. “I thought for sure she was Fred’s.”
“Fuck Fred.” Then I grab the water bottle out of her hand, which spills over her mouth.
She chokes on a laugh, water dripping down her chin. She doesn’t care to wipe it up. “So aggressive.”
“Such a fucking tease.”
She laughs more full-bellied. I almost smile and then I hug her closer to my side. I kiss Daisy’s head, glad to have her right here.
About twenty minutes later, Sulli already ahead of us, we reach the precipice of a mountain, a fire pit already made out of stone. Sulli stands on a secure boulder, face awed as though she’s never seen the horizon.
Daisy and I approach on either side of our daughter, the world vast and landscaped by orange, red and yellow trees. Two birds glide through the bright blue fucking sky. I breathe like this is untouched air, pure—absolved of pain, of death.
Here, I connect to every living thing. To who I am. Where I am. What I am.
“Wow,” Sulli breathes. She saw what death looks like today: a coffin. Buried. Gone.
Right now, the size of this world reflects in her huge green eyes. Overwhelming her. I begin to smile at my daughter, as she looks grateful for this view. To be here.
To be fucking alive.
Wow.
{ 47 }
December 2025
The Hale House
Philadelphia
LOREN HALE
On the couch, Lily glances at me throughout the movie. Toy Story plays on our flat-screen, our toddler watching from his red beanbag and nibbling pretzels while one-year-old Kinney has conked out on Lily’s lap. By this time, I’d pick up Kinney and hold her as she sleeps.
I don’t.
I can’t blame Lily for being concerned.
I’ve also been fidgeting and shifting. Uncomfortable. On this couch. In my skin. I’ve stood up and disappeared in the bathroom about seven times. Just to splash water on my face. Usually, we’re tangled together when we watch movies. Usually, I have my arms around her hips. I’ve wedged more space between us, which draws worried lines across her forehead.
Most days I feel like I can move mountains. Recently I feel like the mountain has fallen on top of me.
My dad’s death is still fresh. Less than a month since the funeral. Yesterday, I told my brother I couldn’t go through our dad’s mansion. I can’t pack his shit up. I can’t be the one to sell the home I grew up in—I selfishly wish he took all of that when he died. It’d be easier.
Ryke just said, “I’ll take care of it. You don’t have to think about a fucking thing, alright?”
“Alright.”
But I am thinking. Every day, my mind won’t stop. With what’s happening tonight, I should be relaxed. Happy, even. Moffy, now ten, was invited to a sleepover, and his six-year-old sister finally got an invite too. Different friends in the neighborhood. Different houses. Both sets of parents signed the non-disclosure agreements with barely a bat of an eye.
Luna practically bounced out the door, overly excited to attend her first sleepover. Even though her interests still don’t line-up with other girls. Even though she still likes to make beeping noises like she’s R2-D2 and BB-8.
I should be happy.
I know I should.
But I can’t shake a feeling that yanks my shoulders. That literally keeps my brain on a repetitive, circular track. Thinking and thinking about the one goddamn thing that could shut down a terrible ache inside my ribs.
I rub my burning eyes.
Antabuse, I remember. I’m on Antabuse. It’s been years since I’ve taken the drug that causes physical illness if I drink alcohol. After my dad’s funeral, I filled my prescription and started up again. I’m terrified of the moment where I convince myself it’s worth it.
The moment where I forget the people I love. Just in a split second. That’s all it’d take. If I’m shoved further down, I feel like I might do it.
I’ve already sat outside a liquor store. Yesterday. The day I called my brother, and he assured me that he’d take care of everything. Then I felt guilty that I shoved these responsibilities on him. I called Lily, and she just spoke softly about Hellion and X-23. I relaxed enough to turn my car around.
Paparazzi tailed me right then. I was lucky they didn’t catch a photo of me in the parking lot. I don’t want my kids to think I chose alcohol over them. Everything is just tearing me up inside.
Just driving there, I feel like I betrayed my family and myself. Guilt should stop me from taking a sip, but I reroute to these thoughts: what’s the point, why not just cross that line and actually do it—then I’ll get something out of it. Then I’ll stop feeling like shit for a moment. Maybe then I’ll just be numb.
I look to Lily, about to tell her that I’m lea
ving the house for a minute. She sees something in my eyes because she says, “Can you hold Kinney?” Lily is about to pass our sleeping daughter to me, but I stand up before she can.
I whisper, “I’m going to go out, just for like ten minutes.”
Lily searches my features, and I do everything to block out the truth.
Not long after, she whispers firmly, “No. You need to stay here.”
“I’m fine, Lily.” Anger laces my voice. “I just want some fresh air. Maybe I’ll go to Ryke’s.”
Lily rises and sets Kinney in a bouncer next to Xander’s beanbag. “I can call Ryke to come here. I think you should stay.”
Ham perks up from his spot next to my youngest son, his dog tags jingling. The basset hound’s big orb-like eyes practically beg me to take him for a walk. Beside him, Xander leans over his beanbag, looking upside-down at me. His brown hair hangs with his head. “Daddy? Where you going?”
