Page 28 of A Daddy for Christmas 2: Kitt

“I won’t do it anymore. I promise. Cross my heart and hope to die.”

“Are you finished eating?”

Yes, but you need something too. Can I make you some waffles?”

He actually shuddered. “No, I’ll get some oatmeal and fruit. I don’t know how you eat like that and stay so slim. It must be your metabolism.”

“I guess,” I said, smiling at him. “Whatever it is, I’m glad for it.”

“I don’t like you eating all that junk. From now on, you eat healthier.”

I laughed and he looked at me oddly, probably thinking I was crazy. But I wasn’t used to anyone caring about what I ate, and it made me feel warm inside and started up those crazy butterflies again in my stomach when he said things like that.

After he finished his breakfast, we went upstairs so he could shower and get dressed. I got in the shower with him again, so it took us a little longer to actually get ready to go. He pretended to be mad, but I don’t think he really was. We went outside around ten o’clock to leave, with Rio bitching all the way downstairs about how we got off to such a late start. In the car parked beside us was a woman with a cute white poodle. The little dog was friendly and happy looking and came up to the window todance around and give excited little yips to get out. I waggled my fingers at it but got in the car so we could leave.

“You like poodles?” he asked me.

“I just like any kind of dog. I love them. They’re all so sweet and so much nicer than people. Dogs really are too good for people.”

He made a little scoffing sound, and I turned to scowl at him. “Well, they are! Dogs are loyal and good. They never say mean things to you or make you feel bad about yourself.”

He glanced over at me and his eyes went dark. “Who made you feel bad about yourself, Kitten? Was it your father?”

“Why do you think I was talking about myself?”

“Just a hunch.”

“Oh. Well, sometimes he did. And my brother sometimes. When my dad spoke to me at all, that is. I don’t think I was the kind of boy he wanted for a son when I was younger. Well, ever. I think he wanted the kind of boy you probably were—the kind who likes sports and playing outside and going fishing and hunting and all of that. I bet you did that kind of thing, huh?”

He shrugged. “I guess so. But that doesn’t make me any better than you or anybody else. There are all kinds of people in the world, honey, who like all kinds of things. I’m sorry no one told you how special you are just by being yourself.”

“I’m not, though. I’m weak and I like girly things, like jewelry. That’s what I heard him say one time, right after my mom died and I went to live with him and my brother. He had found my friendship bracelets in my room, and he looked disgusted and threw them in the trash. That was just after I went to live with him. When my parents divorced, my mom took me, and we went to live with my Pop. My father took Jazz and kept him. Even then, he liked Jazz the best.”

“You were the youngest, though, right? Quite a bit younger than your brother. I’m sure Jazz was easier for your father. That’s all.”

I lifted my head and glanced over at him. “I think you might be prejudiced because you like me a little.”

He laughed. “Yeah, I guess maybe I am.” He winked at me. “You’re know, you’re wrong about dogs though. I mean, they’re cute and all, but they can also be a giant pain in the ass.”

“Why would you say a thing like that?” I said, feeling outraged, though I’d never even had a dog of my own. I knew he was just trying to distract me, so I was playing along. “Did you ever have a dog?”

“I did. Once. As a kid, I got a little mixed puppy—I was like ten or maybe eleven years old—she was just a little mutt my mom found somewhere, with long, reddish hair. She named her Pippi.”

“That’s cute.”

“I thought it was dumb as hell. It was after some fictional character in a book my mother read once. The character had red hair.”

“It’s original, anyway.”

“Is it, though? I’d hated the name—thought it sounded lame and refused to use it, and I just called her ‘Red’ in front of my friends. She didn’t mind though. She really wasn’t all that smart.”

“Oh, don’t say that. I bet she was really smart.”

He laughed again. “Not really. But she was a good girl. My mom picked her out of a box of free puppies from the back of a pickup truck in the Walmart parking lot, and she brought her home for my birthday that year. Pippi was a giant pain in the ass right from the start, following me around everywhere and sleeping at the foot of my bed at night, biting my foot if I moved it under the covers, like she thought there was a cover monsterunder there. She peed everywhere, except, of course, on the newspapers I put out for her. She’d was damn near impossible to housetrain, and sat beside me at the supper table, begging for food by putting her paw on my knee every few minutes, just waiting for me to do the right thing and slip her a bite.”

“I hope you did.”

“What do you think? And she got fat, too, because she loved to eat so much. My mom gave her cookies, no matter how much I complained about it. I saved up some of my allowance money to buy her a black leather collar to make her look a little tougher, but she had this unfortunate tendency of crawling up in my lap and licking my face every chance she got, and that didn’t look so tough. It was something I was never able to break her of. That and peeing on my bedroom rug and tearing the hair out of my little sister’s dolls. She ruined a bunch of them, not to mention that damn rug, so I had to eventually throw it out.”

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