Page 10 of Milk & Cookie

“He lives in the next town over, with his dads.” Daryl casually shoos away a duck when it pecks at his shoelace.

“Dads? Plural?” A scene from a multi-partnered why choose romance off one of Daryl’s recommended-reading lists springs to my mind, and I gulp. “Do I want to know?” I hold up both hands, to stop him from telling me, and then I lower them again with a moan. “Of course, I do. I need to know. Almost as badly as I need to lie down.”

“I’d wait till I was somewhere else to get horizontal, if I were you.” Daryl glances at the duck-turd-littered ground and moves his feet farther away from the nearest splatter.

I lower my head to my hands and scrub at my face before I look his way. “Just tell me everything I need to know so my mind can stop making up awful bullshit. Please.”

He nods and pats my shoulder. “It’s not like what we did for Ben and Maggie, so you didn’t miss out on leading a gang bang, if that makes you feel any better.”

My mind throws up an image of Frederica, bent over a frame, getting milked and bred by five very large mountain men. She doesn’t look as happy about it in my imagination as Maggie was during the actual process, and I’m grateful for Daryl’s strange offer of comfort. There was nothing wrong with what we did, but it’s hard to think about Fred being shared without me, when I’d want to be there to make sure she was safe and it was good for her.

I relax a little. “Okay.” I motion for him to continue. “Tell me.”

“Are you sure you don’t want to hear it from her?” Daryl asks. “I mean, I don’t know her well, so I’m basing this off what I’ve heard around town.”

“I’ll ask her about everything when I see her — trust me — but I can’t go into it blind, with my head spinning the way it is. Give me the Cliffs notes, and I’ll do my own research.”

“I thought you’d have pages of research notes already, Mr. Private Investigator.”

“Haven’t had time for that yet. I met her, told you I was in love, got a snack, and now we’re here. I’ve spent the morning daydreaming, but clearly, it’s time to knuckle down to business. Give me whatever you think you know, and I’ll go validate what I need to.”

Daryl stretches and looks around. “Let’s go back to my place. It’s more private.”

I scan the area too. “There isn’t anybody here.”

He gets to his feet and heads off. “Have you been living in the city so long, you forgot what small-town life is like? Anyone could appear from behind those bushes over there before we’re done talking.” He gestures casually at the shrubbery. “There are some bored people in this town. Isn’t that right, Mrs. Peters?” He says that last part more loudly and tips his hat to an older lady, who stands from her crouched position behind her garden fence, a few molting dandelion stalks in her hand.

She smiles and wishes us a nice day before announcing she’s heading inside, for a cuppa.

“I thought you were fucking with me. Dragging out the process, to milk the suspense,” I mutter at Daryl, as we walk toward his house.

“I wouldn’t do that,” he says with a teasing smile.

“Yes, you would.” I close his front door behind us and pin him to the wall. “Don’t even think about delaying now I’ve planted that seed. Just tell me what I want to know.”

He grins. “Okay. If you’re sure you want to know…”

I tighten my grip on him, and he twists with a high-pitched giggle. “Let me go. We can snuggle later.”

I lower him to the floor but remain in his space. He rolls his eyes. “The story is she and her mom moved to town when Fred was still in high school. They lived in a little cottage, down on old man Morrissey’s farm, and took care of the guy in his final years. I don’t know the ins and outs of it all, but seventy-six-year-old Paul Morrissey had no heirs before Fred made him one — a little girl, she named Morrissey, whose name is on the farm’s deed declaring her the owner. Needless to say, they all live in the big house now.”

I stare at him, speechless, my mind twisting to understand a child-bearing relationship between a man apparently on his deathbed, and a girl of eighteen or so.

“I know, right?” Daryl points at my face. “Anyway. She clearly loves the kid — loves all her kids. Has been heard saying they’re her purpose for being on this earth. The others came about when word travelled, and a gay couple from the next town over came to ask if she’d help them make their dreams come true. The general assumption, is that she obliged and produced a boy for them, in exchange for the ingredients for two more kids of her own — with the necessary deposits from each of the deliriously happy new dads.”

I rub at my head as it starts to ache, and follow Daryl as he moves toward his office. “So… she loves and wants kids, but not necessarily their dads,” I think out loud. “I mean, she’s gorgeous and sweet, with a really cock-plumping forward manner. If she wanted a man around, she could easily have a boatload of kids with any fella, but she had them with a dying man and two guys in a committed relationship — with each other and not her. That’s like… going out of her way to avoid keeping a man in her life, right? I’m not imagining it?”

Daryl stops just inside his office and turns to give me a blank look. “I have never once thought about it like that. I’ve been too busy assuming she’s a crazy person and keeping my distance. Will you do the same?”

I sit down at his desk. “Why would she target me? I’m not going to knock her up, and then leave my kid to be raised without me. Is that the kind of guy I come across as? That’s what she sees when she looks at me?”

“Why are you asking me shit I can’t answer?” He shrugs. “Go ask her yourself.”

I start to nod, but shake my head instead. “Not yet. I need to do some more digging. Get better informed.” I tap my fingers on his desk, and then sit down. “What’s her last name?” I ask, reaching for a pen and paper.

“You don’t know?” Daryl scoffs. “Thought you were in love with her.”

“I can love her and not know her full name. Come on.” I stab the pen at the paper impatiently. “Name. Occupation. Kid’s names, if you know them. Her mother. The gay dads. Everything.”

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