Scandalous Scotsman - M.J. Fields Page 0,42
life without whatever stress it was I caused. And to say I was in a good state of mind would be a gross exaggeration. I’d lost both my parents and coped better with it than I did the thought of not being a part of her life. It was bad, really fucking bad.”
I’m guessing she senses just how close to the edge I was at that time in my life, because she takes my hand. Selfishly, I allow it.
“One of Kai’s therapists suggested I get her a phone so that we could text because, although she wasn’t a great reader, it might cause her to remember the video chats that were always happy times, and at least she would see me still. So, I got her a phone, brought it home, charged it up, and was going to give it to her that weekend.” I pull her hand up to my mouth and kiss it, because I’m moments away from possibly losing her.
Releasing it, I power up the phone. “In the middle of the night, I received a text.” I open the text app and read it.
Daddy,
Today marks eight months that you’ve been gone. Google tells me that’s two hundred and forty-three point three days, five hundred eight hundred forty hours, three hundred and fifty thousand, four hundred minutes…
Monday
One Week Later…
Ethan
Looking in the rearview mirror at my beautiful little Kai nervously chewing on her already too short nails, I force a smile at her, hoping it eases her anxiety and praying she doesn’t see mine.
“Do ye want music, a sheòid?”
When she looks away from me and out the window, I feel the emotional disconnect broadening with each passing mile.
“Kai, are ye excited about a new school?”
“No,” she whispers.
“Excited about the new start?” I ask, hoping to keep her talking.
“No.”
I want to turn around and head right back to the house. Back to the place where I brought her home, finally in my custody after a five-year battle with her mother’s family, a place she talked more, talked louder, played with Scotch, and laughed, fucking laughed.
I know I can’t afford to get emotional, but it’s hard, so damn hard. I also need to keep her talking so she doesn’t freeze up when we get there.
“Do ye miss Scotch?”
Her eyes swing to mine, and she smiles.
“Miss him big or just a little?”
“Miss him huge.”
“I bet he’ll have missed ye, too. Do ye think he’ll stay in yer bed all day, waiting until ye come home?”
Still smiling, she nods.
“Do ye think he’ll try to read all those books or wait for ye to read them to him?”
She rolls her eyes, just like any other ten-year-old preteen would at such a juvenile question, but she answers it. “Dogs can’t read, athair.”
I can’t help beaming.
“I like ye speaking Gaelic to me, Kai. I’ll teach ye more so when ye’re ready, we can fly to Scotland and ye can see the country I came from.” And, God willing, you’ll want to stay there. “Would ye like that?”
She nods.
“Big or just a little?” I ask.
“A little.”
Although I’d hoped for her to say big, the silver lining to her condition is that, when she uses words, she never uses them to lie. It’s like she cherishes their truths and their meanings.
“Ye sure you don’t want to sing with me?” I ask.
She shakes her head and looks back out the window.
I make a mental note to take music off the list of hot topics of conversation with Kai.
“Do ye think ye’d like to swim after school?”
She smiles, still looking out the window.
“Grill some dogs?”
She whips her head back and looks at me with a scowl.
“Hot dogs, a sheòid, not yer dog.”
She crosses her arms and gives me a stern look. “I’m a vegetarian.”
“Right, I apologize.” In my defense, she just decided this since she moved in with me. When I asked her therapist about it, she said that it may be a control thing and I should let her have it, so I do.
“They have vegetarian hot dogs.”
“Gross.”
“Ye used to love bacon. How about some turkey bacon?”
“A turkey is still an animal.”
“Right, of course.” Way to play up the cool dad. “Well, how about ye tell me what ye’d like?”
“Grilled cheese and french fries.”
“Again?” I joke.
“Or pizza.”
“Ye had pizza for lunch, a sheòid,” I say as I pull in the driveway and look for an empty parking space. “So, what else besides grilled cheese?”
She doesn’t reply, just looks out the window.
“Kai, I’m going to go grocery shopping, so any