skims along her back, the other cups her face, and I tilt her head and deepen the kiss. Doesn’t take long for my blood to run warm. Doesn’t take much for me to get lost in my bride.
My body shifts to the side as something solid hits my leg, and when I look down, I’m met by gray eyes identical to my own and a head full of blond curls. I smile, because she’s dressed herself. Purple shirt with a glittery black cat on it, black leggings, a pink tutu and cowboy boots. She’s a ball of fire and a combination of everything good about me and Rachel.
She grins up at me, proud of her fashion choices, proud we let her dress herself, proud I’m her father—as if I’m the man who pulls the sun up in the morning and hangs the moon at night. “Hi, Daddy.”
Daddy. The title hits me each and every time straight in the heart—in a good way. In the best way. Rachel kisses my cheek before walking away. In less than a heartbeat, I scoop up my daughter and a peace descends upon me when her arms wrap around my neck.
I start for the table and just as I lean down to put her in her chair, I tickle her side and she breaks out into giggles. Ariel spots the pancakes and hops onto her knees so she can reach over for more than she’ll eat.
Rachel takes her seat at our small round breakfast table, and I take mine. We smile at each other then at our daughter, who pours too much syrup on her overly large stack of pancakes, and we listen to her chatter about first days, tying her own shoes and how she wants a puppy.
Rachel and I aren’t the only parents parking their cars to walk their children into school. Cars of all makes and models fill the lot, and I choose a spot in the back. First day of school is driving me slowly insane—and I survived foster care. If I’m feeling this way, then so are the other parents and I won’t have their nerves wrecking my car.
Owning a car shop that not only repairs cars but remodels and restores them, Rachel and I have several cars, most of which we fixed up together. This car is Ariel’s favorite—a 2004 Mustang SVT Cobra Supercharger. As we pull up, the engine growls because it’s technically not street legal with the cutouts Rachel and I installed, but it did fine for the five miles of my smallest angel’s first ride to school.
I turn off the car, slide out and grab Ariel’s race car backpack, which has pink ribbons tied to the handle. Rachel unhooks Ariel from her car seat in the back and she springs out of the car, bright eyed and full of energy for the day. Maybe the extra syrup wasn’t a good idea.
She holds Rachel’s hand, and I don’t believe Ariel takes a breath as she talks about who she hopes will be in her class, how she hopes she gets to take the class guinea pig she learned about at orientation home first and that maybe she should have worn her tap shoes.
Rachel laughs at the last part, and I crack a grin. Tap shoes in school. Rachel and I would have been called into the principal’s office on the first day. That probably would have been a record. But because my daughter is precocious, I do a quick check of her backpack to make sure she didn’t drop in her tap shoes as a back-up pair for later.
I don’t find them, but I do find the ballet slippers and I leave those in there. Don’t see the harm in them, but then again, I’m probably not the best judge.
At the entrance, several school officials greet parents and students with big smiles. They’re explaining how, for school security, this is as far as the parents can go. We heard about this at orientation, and we respect it, but there’s a part of me that would feel better if I could see my daughter in her seat instead of just setting her free into the building.
“Isaiah,” Rachel says. “Watch Ariel while I pick up her transportation stickers.”
They’re stickers they’ll put on Ariel’s backpack and back, along with a plastic bracelet they’ll put around her wrist that informs anyone looking how she’s heading home and who will be picking her up. Better believe I’ll be out here waiting for