Page 97 of Daddy, Take Me Away
Shaking my head at her antics, I scooped her out of the tub. “Aughhh, mermaids need water. Can’t breathe. Halp!” she yelled, flailing about.
Laughing, I tightened my hold on her. “Oh no, what happens to mermaids if they don’t have water?”
“They turn into sea carrots.”
Sea carrots? “Baby, do you mean sea cucumbers?”
“Oh yeah, that’s what Tinsley means.”
“You are very silly,” I told her, pressing a kiss to her nose. Setting her on the bed, I turned to get her a clean diaper. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw naked booty cheeks running from the bedroom and back into the bathroom.
“Tinsley Harper!” I scolded before chasing the runaway mermaid.
She was already sitting in the tub, plugging the drain back up. She looked at me in triumph as she flipped the taps back on.
“Tinsley.” I tried to be stern, I really did, but she was so damn cute.
“Get in the ocean, Dada!” She patted the bath like I didn’t have the two brain cells it took to understand that she was pretending the tub was an ocean.
“Maybe I don’t like the ocean.”
She gasped in outrage.
“What’s in it for me if I get in the ocean?”
“You can play mermaids with Tinsley.”
“Can I be a merman?”
“Nu.”
Snorting at her answer, I started to undress. “Can I be Prince Eric?” I never got to be a fun sea creature. Last time, she made me be Skuttle, the dumb bird who didn’t even know what a fucking fork was.
“Nu.”
“You know, you’re awfully bossy for a mermaid,” I said, climbing in the tub.
“Tinsley is the head mermaid.”
“Oh, I see. Well, can Daddy be the head merdaddy?”
“You can be Ursula.”
I frowned. “The squid lady?” I loved to have this conversation with her. She got so into the details. It drove her crazy when I called Ursula a squid.
“She was a cecaelia, Daddy! A C-E-C-A-E-L-I-A!”
“Right. Right. A seacilla.”
“Daddy!” she yelled as she splashed me.
I threw my head back and laughed, unable to keep the charade going. “I love you so damn much, my little mermaid.”
She giggled and climbed between my legs. “Love you, Dada.”
I laid in the tub with her for another hour while my body became an island for her babies to sunbathe on. Watching her play so freely was such a beautiful gift—one I vowed to never take for granted.
“Tinsley hungry,” she said, bringing me from my thoughts.
