Page 116 of Sharkbait
“You coming?” I ask.
His eyes dart back and forth between our parents and me.
“I’m actually—” He pauses. “I’m going to stay.”
Better him than me.
“Have fun with your little performance, everyone,” I say. “I’m out of here.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
James
"You seem sad, Daddy. Are you okay?” Iris’s little face lights up on the small screen, and I’d give anything to reach through the phone and hug her right now.
I place the phone on its holder while I wipe down the bar.
“Yeah, Rissy Roo, Daddy’s fine.”
But Daddy is not fine. Not at all. I can’t stop thinking about how I left things with Louise last night. I’ll see you around, Cold Brew? I may as well have put the final nail in the coffin of our relationship myself. This is a woman with obvious abandonment issues, and I just walk away from her the moment things get tough?
“You know what, Iris? I’m not fine. Sometimes grown-ups try to put on a happy face for their kiddos because we don’t want you to worry, but you’re a big six-year-old now—”
“Six-and-a-quarter-year-old,” she corrects.
I laugh. “That’s right. Excuse me. You’re a big six-and-a-quarter-year-old now, so I think it’s important that I always tell you the truth. I’m having a bit of a hard day today. Do you ever have hard days?”
“Totally! Yesterday, Marco, this boy in my class, said I smell like a pomegranate.”
“Is that a bad thing?” I ask.
“Of course! It’s a terrible thing!”
Who knew? Last I checked, pomegranates smelled damn good.
“Oh. Well, I’m sorry that happened, sweetie.”
“It’s okay. I told him he smells like a papaya.”
“Good comeback!”
Am I supposed to encourage comebacks? Hell, if I know. This parenting shit is hard. She’s only six, and I feel like we’ve already been through at least seven different stages of development since she was a toddler. Each one seems to require a different set of rules and guidelines.
“What caused your hard day, Daddy?”
How to phrase this so she can understand?
“I, um. Well, I got in a fight with a good friend.”
“Oh! Kind of like me and Marco!”
“Kind of.” I nod.
“What’s your friend’s name?”
I sigh and try to keep my smile. “Louise. Her name is Louise.”
And just like that, as if I summoned her out of thin air, Louise walks into my bar.
