Page 38 of Unbreakable Love

If Josie was getting these wild ideas in her head, Penny’s presence would only make it worse. Right now, I had the weekend to repair the damage already done and no clue on how to start that.

Josie wanted the one and only thing I couldn’t easily give her.

“Right,” Penny muttered. “I’ll clean up and go then.”

“Don’t.” I needed her gone. Now. This had been the worst idea from the start. “I’ll take care of it and bring it over to you later.”

She huffed and shook her head, flashing me a look that wasn’t only filled with pain but also disappointment. “Fine.”

She scooped up her coat but didn’t bother putting it on before she walked straight through my living room and out the front door.

The silence that followed her departure was heavy and thick and weighed down on my shoulders. I dropped my head and stared at the floor beneath my feet, rubbing the back of my head as I figured out what to do next.

I stood in my kitchen, a messy area that had been filled with comfort and ease only moments earlier, and now?

Now I’d never felt more alone.

And maybe a little scared I’d shoved something good away from me.

As much as I wanted to rush into Josie’s room, scoop her in my arms, and pepper her with hugs and kisses and miraculously solve all the problems plaguing my little girl, I waited.

I’d long since learned that comforting Josie came on her timeline, and if she was too upset to speak, she’d only shove me away.

So as much as I hated it, I stayed in the kitchen and cleaned it up. Since Penny had brought over things ready to cook, there wasn’t much to do, but I poured her leftover soup into a container and washed the pot and baking sheet. The bowls and spoons were loaded into the dishwasher and after a quick squirt of soap, I started it.

My house was quiet, no lingering cries from Josie’s room and only the gentle and quiet hum of the heat kicking on and the dishwasher running. The silence left me to my thoughts and regret.

I could have handled the entire night so much better.

I also should have been smart enough to see what Josie was attempting to do given her fascination with wanting a mom.

But it wasn’t like a mom was something I could order off Amazon or add to a Christmas wish list. I hadn’t had the desire for years to get involved with anyone after Josie was born. One, I was too young, too focused on figuring out how to be a parent and graduating high school. I was holding back a two-year-old’s hair while she suffered through her first bout of the flu while my friends were off at prom. I was dealing with growing pains and ear infections while everyone else in town was at Friday night football games and field keg parties afterward. There hadn’t been time.

I’d lost the desire in general to date when so many of the women in town acted like the way to my heart was Josie. And when the last ran off back to college after a summer where I’d thought it was changing. But that didn’t mean my heart didn’t ache for my daughter, who so desperately wanted to be like every other girl in town.

I couldn’t blame her for desiring it. But how was I supposed to solve it? Jump the first new woman who moved to town just because I was attracted to her, and Josie liked her? Life didn’t work that way and I was never going to be the kind of man who paraded women in and out of my life to find someone I wanted to be with and risk breaking Josie’s heart more through it.

If Josie was willing to talk to me at all, she’d be thirsty after her meltdown, so I re-filled her water bottle from school and headed toward her room.

A quiet knock on her door got me a muffled, “What?”

I slowly opened her bedroom door. It was dark, her night-light on her dresser the only muted light in the room and it took me a minute to find Josie underneath piles of blankets and her stuffed animals.

“I brought you some water,” I whispered, stepping into her room. “Can we talk for a little bit?”

She sniffed, the sound making my chest pinch with pain, but she shoved off her blankets and finally revealed herself beneath the mountain of coverings and plush toys. “Avery’s mom takes her every Saturday to go get her nails done and you can never do mine right.”

In my defense, her fingernails were tiny, and my hands were huge. I’d learned to braid after hours and hours of excruciatingly painful practice, but nail polish was a different beast.

“I’m sure that’s really fun for them.”

“And she gets homemade birthday cakes for all of her parties and her mom bakes them, not her dad or her grandma.”

“I know, munchkin. That must be really wonderful, too.”

She sniffed and shrugged. “And she gets her sandwiches cut into hearts and dinosaurs and fun things and she gets little notes put in her lunchbox, too.”

“Well, those are things I can start doing, Josie.”

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