Page 84 of Call You Mine

“You’re kidding me?” Damon says, staring at the black t-shirt in my hand.

I can’t even hide the smile on my face as I watch his eyebrows tighten into that same straight-lined crease they’re always in when he’s angry, or annoyed, or frankly just being his normal broody self.

“If you were looking at yourself right now, you’d agree that this is spot on.” I’m giddy, that’s the only way to explain it. My cheeks are flushed, my heart racing with excitement and my limbs, yeah they feel like Jello. I’m a fucking teenager with a schoolgirl crush.

Caeli kicks her little feet currently dangling from her stroller. The sight of Damon behind a stroller at Disneyland, well let’s just say my ovaries are shaking with need. A crippling need that has me about to mount him right out here on Main Street, and get us both arrested and banned for life.

“Rawr,” Caeli shouts out, making the cutest little face as she scrunches her nose tight. “No nice, Nini,” she says, calling me by the sweetest little nickname she gave me. When Ace told her my name was Auntie Wynnie, it quickly became obvious she wasn’t going to be able to pronounce Wynter. All Caeli understood was the word Nini, which now has stuck.

Damon crouches down beside Caeli. “Yeah, Nini. Not nice to insinuate I’m anything like that guy.” The poor girl gushes at the beautiful man beside her. Reaching for him, she runs her tiny fingers over cheek.

Like me, she must be mesmerized by his beauty. Poor girl’s going to be falling for the broody bad boys when she grows up, just like her mother and aunt. “No ouchy,” she says, looking back at the character on the shirt in my hand.

Damon stands up and raises an eyebrow at me. “See, the kid agrees. Nothing like me.”

I look at the shirt I purchased for him, a simple black t-shirt with the villain Scar from the Lion King’s face on it and the words,“I’m the crazy uncle”written across the top. “The green eyes, dark hair, and daunting glare, you’re basically twins.”

“Twins,” Caeli shouts, her new favorite word since she discovered how many of us she knows.

I squat down to her level, to give her a better view of the shirt. “Yes Caeli, twins. Scar and Uncle Damon are twins. Now tell Uncle D you want him to put on this shirt so we can go on a ride.”

Her face immediately lights up at the mention of rides. Apparently since the last time she was here, Scarlett’s been showing her videos on YouTube of the different rides they tookher on. The girl’s become obsessed, asking nonstop if she could come back. Hence why we’re here, now that Scarlett is feeling too pregnant for things like an impromptu trip to Disney for the day.

I thought about offering Jade to bring the twins along, but my lack of experience with children left me wondering how herding three toddlers would work out.

“Ride! Kiki go on boat.” I laugh at Caeli’s enthusiasm, so easily forgetting she was just on Damon’s side.

“See, Uncle D,” I say, sounding a tad too excited about my victory. I shove the shirt at his chest, and point at the restrooms right behind us. “Go put on your shirt so we can take Kiki on the boat.”

Being backat the happiest place on earth, after quite a long time away, is nostalgic to say the least. Walking down Main Street with a double scoop cone of Cookies and Cream and Strawberry Ice Cream from the Gibson Girl Ice Cream Parlor, inhaling the sweet aroma they release through the vents all around—yes it’s true—I’m the happiest I’ve been in a long time. Probably ever—no yeah definitely ever.

My face hurts from smiling so much. My stomach feels so incredibly full from all the snacks we’ve been eating, and my heart, well let’s just say I’ve felt nothing like what I feel right at this exact moment in time.

Warmth, comfort, safety. For the first time in my entire life, I’m not afraid.

Staring up at Damon wearing a pair of light up Mickey ears on his head as he holds up a pink cotton candy—which Caeli, who’s sitting on his shoulders eats from as we prepare to watchthe fireworks—I’m not sure what alternate universe I’ve fallen into. Never in a million years did I think this man—this guarded, dominant and brooding man—would ever have let his guard down and enjoyed a day of fun like the one we just had.

Frankly, I didn’t think Damon had it in him—which isn’t a fair thing for me to have assumed. Damon’s upbringing is one topic which still holds so much mystery. I know the basics—his father walking out on them, leaving his pregnant, addict mom to raise twins on her own. The death of his mother—overdosing in front of him when he was six years old, then spending days living with her dead corpse until someone found him and Ruby. Growing up at the foster house, though it was a place he soon became comfortable in—was still a hard thing to go through. On top of all that, his adolescent years were full of trouble no child should have to deal with—gangs, drugs, and fighting just to make some money so he wouldn’t have to solely depend on his two foster moms who were working hard to raise all of him and his surrogate siblings.

To make matters worse, when he and his friends were uprooted to Servite Academy because of my bio dad’s psychotic scheming, he once again was left to fend for himself. So he did the one thing he felt was best for someone like him to do with his life. He trusted a monster, much like the ones I’ve dealt with, who took advantage of his ambitions and traumatic past, to fulfill her own fantasy.

Damon never talks about Clarissa O’Neal, the psychotic bitch who brought him into the world he’s now a part of, and I’m not sure I ever want to know what her role in his life was beyond that.

This picture-perfect moment in front of me, is a small glimpse into our future—at least what it could look like if neither one of us carried the demons we do on our backs. The ones that make us second guess this feeling of happiness. The onesthat keep him from fully opening up and committing to what we have.

“Does this finally mark the end of our day here?” Damon asks, looking down and catching me taking a long lick of the cone in my hand. “Baby, please tell me this is it?”

I laugh at his plea, “The parks open for another two and a half hours.”

Damon throws his head back, though quickly remembers Caeli’s sitting on his shoulders. “You keep licking the cone like that, and we’re not even staying to watch this.”

“Nini, look,” Caeli shouts, reaching for me just as the neon lights flash along Sleeping Beauty's castle, and the first dazzling firework bursts into the clear night sky. I take her into my arms cradling her close before placing a soft kiss on the top of her head. Caeli’s excitement is contagious and having her with me, after not being a part of her life, I won’t ever walk away from this again.

An older woman to my left wearing a custom shirt with the words,Johnson Family Vacation,on the front, places her arm on my shoulder and leans in closer to speak. “Enjoy this age,” she says with a kind smile, “Mine are all grown up with babies of their own, yet coming here, being able to experience this with my grandkids, there’s nothing like it.”

My cheeks flush when I realize she thinks Caeli is my daughter. “Thank you,” I say, smiling back. “You have a beautiful family.”

“Yeah, they’re everything to me. But that’s the thing about family. They’re supposed to be your world.”

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