for me, it’s already due tomorrow afternoon because it’s supposed to print in the Sunday edition. I have no choice but to get it done.
Jake’s phone buzzes on the table, and a smile lights his face as he wipes his mouth with his napkin, sets his fork on his plate, and picks it up to answer it.
“Good morning, Chlo,” he says into the space between us, the phone tucked close to his ear. His words are warm and familiar, and his heart is in his eyes.
It’s more than apparent, his sun rises and sets within his daughter.
I smile to myself but duck my head back down to look at my plate.
“Yeah. I know,” he continues his conversation. “Yeah, she’s right across from me. We’re having breakfast.”
He chuckles, and an intense curiosity lights my whole body on fire. They’re talking about me, and I need to know what they’re saying.
“I am being nice,” he asserts. “Why wouldn’t I be nice?”
He laughs again, then snaps at me to look up at him. I do, obviously, and I’m even half confident that I don’t look guilty as hell when I do. No, no, Jake. I haven’t already been listening to your conversation with bated breath at all…
“What?” I mouth, but he waves a hand to say never mind.
“What, then? Do you want me to send proof of life or something?” Curiosity makes me scrunch my face as he offers, “I could take a picture of her right now. Send it to you.”
Panic shoots into my veins. Whoa, whoa, whoa. No pictures of me are supposed to occur.
“I am being serious,” he responds, a perpetual chuckle making the air between us vibrate. “You’ll see her tonight, and you can ask all the questions you want yourself…” He pauses, and I listen harder. It doesn’t help, but my ears do ring a little with the extra concentration. “Yes. Dinner at Boogie’s.”
Boogie’s?
Familiarity makes my synapses light up. My dad and I have been going to a place named Boogie’s ever since he sold the family farm in Iowa and moved out here to retire and be closer to me a couple years ago. He says it’s the only thing that makes him feel even remotely close to home. Well, that and me.
“Listen, Chlo, I have to go. Gotta be at work in half an hour.” He shakes his head and rolls his eyes. “I know I’m the boss, but it doesn’t matter. What are you doing today?”
He listens for a minute, transforming from playful back to full-on dad mode. “Okay. Text me when you get there, text me when you leave. You know the drill. And be careful. Always pay attention to your surroundings, yeah?”
Chloe’s response makes him smile. “I know I always say it, and I always will. Even when you’re forty.”
I set my fork down and settle my hand into my chest, no doubt in an attempt to stop the newly awakened flutter under my ribs. Goodness gracious, single dads—good ones—really do have a hotness about them that’s unmatched. I think it’s because they show their ability to love. With every conversation, every kiss, every consideration they give their kids, women see the opportunity to be given the same. It’s concrete, black-and-white evidence of a man’s ability to think outside of himself. Which isn’t exactly on the top of the list of the male’s biological strengths.
“I know. I love you too, kid. Bye.”
He tosses the phone back to the top of the table with little finesse and picks up his fork again to dig back into his hash browns. He doesn’t even notice that I’m trying to reconstitute myself from the puddle of goo his conversation formed. Thank everything.
Why is it always like that? Why is a father being loving to his kids always so special? Moms are that way all the time, and no one seems to notice.
I don’t know. There’s, like, some kind of biological trigger or something. My ovaries have fired up the power bank and are ready to start pumping out some product, I’ll tell you that. Little fucking baby factories. Meanwhile, Shell’s here sweating her tits off to make ends meet, and nobody’s banging down her door, trying to give her a glass-plated trophy. The only one who’s seemed to notice is Jake, and for as kindhearted as he is about her situation, I also don’t get the sense that he has in any way, shape, or form tried to date her.