Page 159 of Spies Don’t Fall for Their Best Friend

Blake

I’m halfway through Heidi’s second bedtime story when she suddenly gasps, making me sit straighter before I even know what happened. “What?”

She grabs Bunny from beside her pillow. “‘Mergency.”

“What kind of emergency?”

“Her toof hurts.”

I look at the stuffed rabbit. Bunny looks back at me with the same stitched-on expression she has worn through every medical crisis Heidi has invented for her. “Which tooth?”

Heidi tips Bunny back and peers seriously at her mouth, even though Bunny doesn’t technically have teeth. Then she pokes her little finger in the place where Bunny’s mouth is. “That one. You have to fix it.”

“It’s bedtime, sweetheart.”

She gives me a devastated look. “But Daddy, it hurts.”

I sigh. This is how I always end up practicing dentistry after hours on patients who don’t have mouths. “Okay. I’ll take a look at Bunny’s hurt tooth.”

Heidi immediately brightens. “You need your dentist coat.”

I shake my head. “I don’t need it.”

“It won’t work if you don’t wear it.”

There are some kinds of three-year-old logic that just can’t be disputed, no matter how hard you try. “Stay here,” I say. Then I retrieve one of my clean white dental coats and put it on. I grab my headlamp and put it on, too.

When I return, Heidi claps. “Now you’re Dr. Daddy.”

“I’ve been Dr. Daddy the entire time.”

“No. Before you were just Daddy.”

I sit on the edge of her bed and hold out my hand. “Patient.”

Heidi carefully transfers Bunny into my arms.

“How long has the tooth been hurting her?”

Heidi thinks hard. “She fell off the couch after dinner.”

“Ouch.”

Heidi nods solemnly. “She bounced.”

I turn on my headlamp and examine the general vicinity of Bunny’s mouth while Heidi watches like I’m performing emergency surgery.

My phone chimes, but I ignore it. I’m busy being Dr. Daddy, taking care of an emergency dental issue. It chimes again, then twice more. My phone is by the book I set down on the bed, so I say, “Siri, read text messages.”

Siri begins.

Charlie: Okay, I did the math.

Emerson: You just said my favorite sentence.

Charlie: Ledger and Zoe got engaged.

Charlie: 49 days later, Owen and I got engaged.