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“It smells great in here. What did you cook?”
“Enchiladas and Spanish rice,” I said.
“Mac and cheese for me,” my daughter said. “I don’t like rice.”
“Well, I love rice,” Heather said. “So I’ll eat your portion.”
Oh, I adored a woman who ate.
We all sat down at the table and dished up our food, and Heather was not shy when it came to what she wanted. My daughter was taken with her. I could see Audrey constantly catching glances of her. I had told her that Heather was trying to help me give her a brother or sister. At four years old, she didn’t quite understand what that meant, and that was just fine by me. In her mind she probably thought that meant Heather was going to help me pick a baby out at the store or something.
“So,” Heather said, “how was your day?”
She looked over at my daughter, and I watched her perk up a bit, something she never did in the presence of strangers. It was something she seemed to always be doing with Heather.
“I went to school,” she said.
“On a Saturday? You must really like school.”
“Yeah. They have caterpillars.”
“Do you like caterpillars?” Heather asked.
“They’re my favorite animal.”
“You know what mine is?”
“What?” my daughter asked.
“Horses.”
“Do you ride them?”
“I used
to, a long time ago, when I was your age,” Heather said.
I marveled at the conversation as they went back and forth. Audrey didn’t talk to anyone like that. Ever. Hell, sometimes she didn’t even talk to me like that. I sat there, eating my food and drinking my water, watching my daughter very quickly come out of her shell around this woman.
It made me wary of the decision I’d made with her. The last thing I needed was my daughter getting attached to a woman who wasn’t staying. I was fortunate enough that she didn’t remember her mother and the havoc that woman had wreaked.
I didn’t need her remembering Heather being there and then not.
“Will you be here when the baby comes?” Audrey asked.
Heather’s fork fell from her hand, and she started coughing. She reached for her water as her face turned red, and I watched my daughter reach over and start patting her back.
“It’s okay,” Audrey said. “Cough harder.”
My head fell back, and I swallowed the groan rising up my throat.
“I, um, what was that?” Heather asked.
“Nothing,” I said. “It was nothing. Princess?”
“Yeah?”
“It’s bedtime,” I said.
