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She doesn’t wait for my answer.
She knows in her heart who she is staring at.
“She is so beautiful.”
“Oh, honey, don’t cry,” I plead when tears splash her cheeks. “Daddy didn’t put them up to make you sad.”
“I’m not sad.” She wipes her bunny across her face before using his floppy ear as a tissue. “I’m happy.”
I bob down to her level. “Are you sure? You look a little upset, and it’s okay if you are, as long as you know they’re not there to make you sad. Your daddy loves you very much, and so does your mommy.” I wave my hand at the photographs of them. “This proves that.”
“How?” she asks, her little lip quivering.
“It’s like when you can’t find the right words, so you use gestures instead.”
A memory of my father leaving a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on the piano in the great room every Tuesday afternoon flashes into my head as Lucy approaches me. “Like this.”
I laugh when she noogies my head, which adds more knots to the mess her father’s grip made when I went down on him in the shower.
“Yes, like that.” I tug her into my chest. “We all have our own unique ways of showing people how much we love them. Some are silly. Some are annoying. And some you won’t remember until it’s too late.”
Quickly, I brush my hand across my cheeks to ensure no tears have fallen before scooping Lucy into my arms and moving her closer to the wall of photographs to ensure she faces no issues taking in all the features she was gifted from her mother.
Her trip down memory lane warms my heart as well. My father wasn’t the same after my mother was killed, but peering at a relationship similar to ours from the outside has me seeing things differently than I did when I was sixteen. I resented him for burying himself in work instead of giving him a reason to hold on, but he didn’t hate me for that.
He loved me. His grief was just too intense for him to remember that when it mattered the most.
I press my lips to Lucy’s temple and breathe in her scent when she praises her mother’s beauty for the second time. “She is sooo pretty.”
“She sure is.” Confident she’s had enough sentimental muckiness for one morning, I dip her until her piggy tails hit the floor, then attack her ribs. “Just like you.”
She squeals during our gallop down the stairs and our race through the swinging kitchen door, and then she screams some more when she finds her father at the cooktop, flipping pancakes.
“You made pancakes two days in a row!” When she wiggles to be placed down, I oblige. “This has to be a miracle.” She twists to face me. “He’s never made pancakes two days in a row.” Hunger blazes through her eyes as she licks her lips. “We need syrup. Lots and lots of syrup.”
As she races for the walk-in pantry, I drift my eyes to Brodie. “Morning.”
I hate my cracked tone, but my self-loathing only hangs around as long as it takes Brodie to reply, “Morning.” After flipping a pancake, he checks the coast is clear before tugging me in and placing an impromptu kiss on the edge of my mouth.
His public display of affection is so unexpected I’m left a little gobsmacked. We agreed last night that anything we do after hours shouldn’t affect Lucy, so I was half expecting another case of amnesia.
Grinning, Brodie closes my mouth before giving it a reason to gape again. “You don’t deserve to be ignored. Neither back then nor now.”
Tears prick my eyes, but with Lucy back at my side, looking up at me suspiciously, I don’t have time to respond to them. Her pout is super cute and very dramatic.
“Are you okay?” I ask her like she’s the one acting out of sorts.
“I can’t find the syrup.” Her devastated voice would have you convinced the world was about to end.
I arch a brow while spinning to face the pantry. “It should be on the shelf where we left it yesterday. Want me to help you?”
She nods so fast that she makes my head spin before she leads our charge to the pantry.
I’m taken aback when I notice the mess. Brodie and I were a little eager, but I had no clue the stickiness slicking my skin wasn’t solely sweat until now.
My footprint is on the baker-size bag of flour on the pantry floor, and several tins and condiments are either sitting askew or on the floor.
I try to keep a straight face, but the fight becomes unbearable when Lucy folds her arms under her chest and says with a huff, “Daddy, I think we’ve got a raccoon im-fes-tation again!”
“What the fuck did you do with my uptight, ‘I don’t need anyone but my daughter in my life’ brother-in-law? And where the fuck can I get some of that magic for myself?”
