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“That,” I said, walking down the dock toward where Cato was sitting off the edge of it, watching Aggie paddle around the water, “is no child of mine. Willingly exercising? The horror,” I said, dropping down next to Cato who automatically wrapped an arm around me.
“I would worry she’d been swapped at the hospital if it weren’t for her inhuman ability to put away white cheddar popcorn just like her mother,” Cato agreed.
“This is true. White cheddar popcorn cravings are more accurate than any paternity test,” I declared, watching as Aggie suddenly started paddling in a circle.
Too fast.
Too reckless.
Too much like both of her parents.
“Damnit!” she cried, almost falling over the side of the kayak to retrieve the book that she’d sent flying over into the water in the process.
Yep.
We were the kinds of parents who let our fourteen-year-old curse.
And recklessly twist her kayak around in alligator-infested waters.
“There’s a healthy dose of her Aunt Josie in there too,” Cato decided, as Aggie desperately tried to dry the sopping book with the very shirt she was wearing.
She looked like us.
Tall and slender, but the slightest bit bottom-heavy like her mom. With long, dark hair, but really gorgeous green eyes like her father.
She was, at times, the best and worst of us.
Stubborn and thrill-seeking.
But kind-hearted, loving, and confident.
I think, through raising Aggie, Cato and I had managed to heal a lot of the wounds from our own childhoods.
Where we may have endured endless birthdays with no cakes or presents, we showered our girl with extravagance and surrounded her with love.
Where I hadn’t been allowed to dress up for Halloween or go pumpkin picking, we all dressed and took yearly trips to New England to really get the fall vibes.
Through her little girl wonder, I had even learned to fall in love with the wonder of Christmas. Which had meant that Cato needed to put an extra storage shed on our property to accommodate all of the decorations I had accumulated over the years.
She got all of the love and security that we hadn’t gotten, which had allowed her to grow up just slightly more open, more trusting, and less cynical about the world.
We watched as Aggie paddled back to the dock, and climbed up the ladder.
“Can I call Aunt Josie to see if she’ll take me to the bookstore?” she asked, showing us the damaged book. “It was just getting good.”
“I’m sure she’ll be happy for an excuse to go to the bookstore for the fourth time this week,” I said, nodding. “You know where my wallet is,” I added.
Aggie had unlimited book-buying money.
I’d mostly stepped back from the secrets-dealing business over the years, wanting to spend more time with my family, and less time potentially getting myself hurt or killed. But I’d lucked out in finding several other people who still had that thirst for adrenaline and espionage as I once did. They mostly did the jobs now. While I got to just collect a portion of the income.
Which left me time to devote to my true passion. Golden Glades only Halloween village.
Sure, it only operated for three weeks out of the year, but it took me all year to make it bigger and better each time.
I was even considering creating off-shoots of it in other states in the future.
Eventually.
