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“I’ll buy you another.”
But still, she eats and eats and eats, putting away food and storing it up for later.
Once she polishes off all but the last bite, and chugs the milkshake until her stomach expands and she sloshes when she moves, I pay for our meal and push up to stand.
Before she can jump off the stool and into my arms, I take off my jacket and wrap her in it as best I can to keep her warm. I slide the zipper all the way to her chin, and fold up the sleeves so her hands come through the end. I lift the collar to keep her neck warm, then I grab her up in a bundle and carry her out into the cold.
There’s a park nearby with snow on the ground and one of those rides where you sit inside and it just spins… and spins… and spins.
Mia gets two turns on that shit before my stomach rolls.
Ninety minutes after arriving, we leave again with more grime on her face, but wearing grins that make our cheeks burn and Mia’s eyes dance.
She’s just a little girl who lives her life inside a bubble. In her mom’s apartment, or inside Mrs. Harburger’s. She doesn’t often get to come to the park except when I bring her, and she never gets company except from the neighbor’s cat.
But despite it all, she’s the most amazing kid I’ve ever known… and it just so happens that she’s half mine.
I’m not the dad she deserves, and there isn’t shit I did in my life to earn her. But here she is anyway—and it’s Jada’s existence in my life that made this happen.
Maybe my wife cheated on me, and maybe she’s a pathetic shell now of who she used to be. Maybe she hates me half the time, and begs me to stay the rest. Maybe I send her three quarters of my paycheck every week, and still, my daughter eats cereal for dinner while Jada lays in bed and ignores her.
But she gave me the most precious gift of all. And for that, there has to be understanding. Grace. Kindness.
“Did you have fun?” I carry Mia on my hip and move up the last flight of stairs outside the apartment. It’s dark out now, and the stench of overcooked and over-flavored dinners permeates the halls. “Daddy had loads of fun with you.”
“I want to go on the spinny more.”
I choke out a soft laugh and adjust her weight in my arm as I shuffle the bag of takeout we grabbed for Jada. “Just looking at the spinny thing makes Daddy wanna puke, Moo. Doesn’t it make you sick?”
“Nuh-uh.” She shakes her head hard enough to mess with the weight distribution in my arms and force me to adjust. “It makes me happy when I spin.”
A lazy grin makes its way across my lips, because Jada used to say a similar thing about her dancing. She liked to spin, too. To stand on her toes and twirl and twirl and twirl.
I never could understand how she didn’t feel sick, but I guess it’s a thing, considering Mia feels the same way.
“Mommy used to spin like that,” I tell my daughter quietly. “When she danced on a big stage with lights and music and people in the audience.”
“Did she fall down when she spun?”
“Nope.” I open the apartment door and lower my voice. The TV continues to play cartoons, and the living room remains shadowed and dreary. “She didn’t fall down once…”Until the end, of course.And she hasn’t managed to get up since.“Let’s go find Mommy and—”
Soft moans trickle on the otherwise still air as I turn and shut the door. Rustling fabric. Then a cry of passion that makes my stomach revolt and my memories span back a decade to when we were young and new.
“Moo?” My heart thunders as the noises from the end of the hall grow louder. “Can you wait here for Daddy?” I set her down on the couch and point toward the television set. “Just for one minute?”
“Okay,” she whispers. Like she knows she has to be quiet. “I’ll wait here.”
“Thank you.” Leaning forward and fixing the way my coat drowns her in thick cloth, I press a lingering kiss to the center of her forehead. Then, breaking away before my aching heart allows me to say something I can’t take back, I turn on my heels and move into the hall on light feet.
Jada’s panting grows louder. Her strained words of pleasure. Her tiny squeaks of ecstasy.
I stop by her door and look into the main bedroom to find my ex-wife getting slammed by some asshole with a giant dragon tattoo on his back. His hair is shaved almost to the scalp. His back is covered in filthy pimples and welts that Jada’s scraping nails make bleed. He holds her legs up in ways I’ve done in the past, but he pummels her body like she’s nothing more than a dog in heat.
My temper alights, not because I don’t want any man to touch her, but because she was bedridden all day when she should’ve been with her child, and now she has the energy to fuck this dude.
Repulsed, I turn away without saying a word and move into Mia’s bedroom.
This room is tidy, where the rest of the apartment is filthy. Her bed is made—not well enough to assume an adult did it, but as best as a toddler can manage.
