Page 68 of Quiet Beautiful Things

She looks down at the kitten, her face morphing into a deep frown. A tear sits in the inner corner of her eye as she holds the cat out to the teen worker.

I face Ellie. “She doesn’t know we’re here to take him home. She thinks this was just to play. Like a petting zoo.”

I sit down next to her and put the cat back in her lap. I sign, “We take.”

I thought she knew ‘take,’ but she seems confused.

Ellie pulls a drawing pad from her purse, quickly does a sketch, and hands it to Maisy. It’s the typical drawing of my house, Maisy and me inside, with Maisy holding her stuffed cat. But Ellie drew another cat, a small yellow one, down by Maisy’s feet. She even made one leg slightly shorter than the others. She points to the yellow cat in the drawing and then to the kitten. “You take,” she signs.

Maisy’s eyes dart from the drawing to the kitten then back to the drawing then up to me. She raises a brow. She does that a lot now. I guess it’s her way of asking my permission.

“Yes,” I sign. “We take him home.”

I’m not sure if she still doesn’t understand, or if she’s in shock, but she goes completely still. Then, my entire world changes because she puts the kitten on the floor and climbs into my lap, her little arms snaking around me.

I try to hold it together as I get the very first hug from my daughter, but emotion overcomes me. I bury myself in her curls and let the tears roll down my cheek. I must look like a certified pussy. Thank God Lucas and my friends aren’t here to witness my ridiculous display.

When I look up, Ellie is crying too.

After Maisy gets off my lap, I pull out my phone.

Me: I swear to God, I’m going to give that girl the world.

Ellie sniffs back more tears, then she smiles as I hand over my credit card and make a very fat donation.

Chapter Twenty-five

25

Ellie

Watching Maisy and the kitten is surreal. I swear they both had that same distant look in their eyes, but now that they’re playing together, the look is gone, replaced by something else. Sheer joy.

“Cat needs a name,” I sign to Blake.

“I’ll let Maisy name him.”

Me: She may just call him cat. Proper names are new to her. It might be easier if you pick one.

He shrugs and watches the two play. Tilting his head to the side, one way then the other, he works his chin with his fingers. “How about Bolt?” he fingerspells the name.

I look at the white streak on the kitten’s side. It does kind of look like a bolt of lightning. “Perfect,” I sign. I don’t have to fingerspell it. He knows the sign. And based on the intense, lustful look he’s giving me, he knows I know he knows. I feel myself blush.

Maisy and Blake spend the next half hour learning the signs for all the cat supplies. We decide, in order to simplify things for Maisy, we’ll call the litter box the cat’s toilet.

Me: You should make it her responsibility to do something for Bolt. Feeding him maybe. Keeping his water bowl full.

Blake: Isn’t she a little young for that?

Me: Not at all. Kids are capable of doing a lot more than most parents assume. It’ll be good for her. She needs to feel like she’s contributing. I know you want to coddle her, Blake. You see her as this fragile little flower. You said you want to give her everything. But you can’t spoil her because she’s deaf. Too many parents make the mistake of trying to overcompensate. Even my own parents were guilty of it from time to time.

Blake: I’m not going to spoil her because she’s deaf. I’m going to spoil her because it makes her happy and making her happy has just become my life’s mission.

This man. How is it that whenever he says something charming like that, especially when it concerns his daughter, it’s like he’s shooting a tether straight into my heart.

If I wasn’t aware of his unsavory past, I’d say he was a keeper.

Me: Well, Bolt seems to make her happy all right.

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