Page 28 of Irrevocably Mine

The nightin the hotel was proving both calming and unsettling—calming because he put everything aside, they didn’t even turn on the t.v., and he got to know his daughter; unsettling because he felt off where Stacy was concerned. He wanted to call her, just to hear her voice and ensure she was safe. There was no rhyme or reason for it, but something didn’t feel right. Maybe she had already made her decision and it wasn’t the one he’d hoped for.

That thought was like a constrictor coiling around his chest and squeezing the air from his lungs. His eyes sought his silent phone to see if Stacy had texted or called. Just then, his daughter’s voice broke through his thoughts, and he stared into eyes so much like his own. The snake loosened its grip, and a measure of peace washed over him. Dax reached forward, tucking a wayward strand of hair behind her ear and cupping her cheek. He was doing a hell of a lot of that, it seemed. Maybe because it reminded him of when she was younger, and all that was taken from him, but his little Macy Bug was here.Right here. Right now, but he wasn’t living in the moment. Half of Dax’s heart and thoughts were in Florida.No, he decided. I have lost too much time with Macy. Time I will never get back; I refuse to give her half-measures now. She deserves more, and so do I.

With his new mindset, he turned the phone off completely, giving Macy his undivided attention. He would check in with Stacy when they returned and their relationship would be settled once and for all. Tonight, he just wanted to be with his daughter and get to know the young woman who was sitting cross-legged on the bed in front of him, doodling in a book and chattering away. “Earth to…”

“No need to do an interplanetary call, Bug, I’m listening. I wanted to ask you something, why is it you haven’t been checking your phone constantly like most girls your age do? Instead, I see you drawing and writing most of the time. Do you not have any good friends?”

Macy didn’t miss a stroke of the pencil, even when she made eye contact. “Geez, Dad, I’m not some loser, of course, I have friends. It’s because I don’t have one. Well, I do, but it’s an old flip phone that I only turn on when I go out with friends, which I have plenty of by the way, or when I was away from Mom. She didn’t want me to have my nose stuck in a phone all the time, missing out on what’s right in front of me because I was throwing birds at pigs or texting friends who weren’t there and ignoring the ones who were.” She dropped her eyes back to her drawing momentarily before returning her gaze to him and lowering her pencil.

“Besides, I enjoy drawing. It’s how I absorb my world. It’s been a constant in my life. Mom did break down and buy me a new phone before she went into rehab, but it’s in my pack, still sealed in the box. If I had been raised like the empty-headed girls at school,” she held the drawing out for Dax to examine, “I would overlook things like this.” Without looking at the drawing, Dax’s estimation of both Sam and Macy rose significantly.That’s exactly what I would’ve done if Macy had been with me.More and more of himself was becoming apparent in a daughter he hadn’t seen in years. In many, many ways.

When he took the sketchbook from her, he gasped. She was more like him than she knew. The drawing was a portrait of him that he could not believe she had done with a number two pencil only. The shading and depth of color seemed infinite, and the likeness, remarkable. Macy was an artist, no doubt about it, but it was what else she captured that had him in awe. Both eyes were focused on the artist, but one looked at her intently and lovingly, with hope brimming over the lashes and a serene face surrounding it on that side.

The other half spoke of unsurety and insecurity. And while the eyes were focused on the artist, that one was somehow looking away, off into the distance—concern, and a certain nervousness swimming in the depths of the gray strokes. Dax was gob-smacked. He had no words. “I…how…”

His daughter laid her hand on his, still gripping the pad. “I draw what I see, and that’s what I see. What is it that has you so divided? Is it me? Do you not…”

“The Thing’s rock hard c…uh, fist. Do not even finish that question.” The words were spoken harsher than he intended but he couldn’t even stand to hear what he was certain she was going to ask. “I want you more than I want to breathe. I have since the minute you were conceived. Every minute of your life only strengthened that, even when you weren’t with me. That will never change, Bug, no matter what I do, you do, or anyone else does, you got that? I love you with everything I have, and I always will.”

The thud of his back snapping against the headboard was lost over the sobs of his daughter and feel of her in his arms. She launched into his lap just like when she was five. Physically, she looked like a young lady and, intuitively and intellectually, she was beyond that, but emotionally, in that moment, she was just his little Bug. “Shush, don’t cry. Every tear you cry lands on my soul. What’s wrong, did I do something to hurt you? I’m sorry, I didn’t…”

A sniffle-laced, almost childlike voice answered him, “No.” Sniff. “You did everything right.” Sniff. “I love you so much daddy.” Sniff, sniff, sniff.

The last two sniffs were from him.Daddy. She called me Daddy. Not Dad or Dax, but Daddy.It was like a DeLorean going eighty-eight miles per hour.Note to self, spend less time with the Trivia Savant Tori.The years melted away, he wasn’t holding a teenager dressed in denim and leather, he was holding a happy child dressed in tutu with a tear-streaked face; a little, dark-eyed, light haired angel who had begged for ballet lessons for months, dancing around the house in a tutu every day to show her dedication and love for the dance; a taller-than-the-rest-of-the-students, Macy Bug, who just finished her first class and launched herself at her dad on the parent’s bench before even being dismissed by the instructor.

It shouldn’t have shocked him that she did it now, Macy had always been an all or nothing kid, and that had not changed. She felt things and let them encompass her. Dax used to be just like her, and right now, he missed that part of himself. If he had not dialed it back, he would already have Stacy, if that’s how it was going to go, and Macy would have never drawn a picture capturing half of him.

“I’m sorry I didn’t give you my undivided attention. You deserve so much more than that, Bug. I’m out of practice at this parenting thing. But I’ll catch up soon enough. No worries.”

“Wait, did you just useThe Thingas a curse? Is that how you talk all the time?” She burrowed deeper into his lap.

“No, Bug,” he laughed, “just this month.” Dax knew she didn’t get it, and that was okay. She would learn his quirky ways as he learned hers.

Another sniffle was all the warning he got before Macy asked the questions he was avoiding. Not because he didn’t want to tell her, he just didn’t want to dump adult problems on a kid. “Is it a girl? That’s bothering you, I mean. Do you love her? Wait, are you remarried? I mean, it’s okay if you are, I understand, I just want to know.” Then, the atom bomb of questions came, “Will she like me?”

Dax created enough distance between them to make eye contact. “First off, it doesn’t matter if anyone, anywhere, no matter who they are, likes you. If they don’t, then they are not worth our time. We are a package deal, period. Secondly, I am not remarried, nor do I plan to be. I can be with a woman, one that loves us both, and not be married. Even though it would be solid before I introduce you, don’t worry about marriage. A family isn’t built around a piece of paper; it’s built around love. And thirdly, Stacy will love you like crazy, no doubt about it.”

Macy laughed, much the way he had when it hit him the other day. “We rhyme. That’s a good sign, right? Do you love her, or more importantly, does she love you? Not the friendly way Mom did either, but the dreamy Holder and Sky kind of love, like inHopelessby Colleen Hoover.”

“What isHopeless?”

“It’s just like my favorite book ever, but never mind that, does she?”

Dax didn’t really have to think about the answer, somehow, he knew she did. The question in his mind was if it would be enough to unseat the claws of her yesterdays.

“I believe she does, Bug. I take that back, I know she does, I can just feel it, but she’s been through a lot. She’s tough as nails and doesn’t need anyone to take care of her and, well, I have to show her that I can do just that, but not because she needs it, but because I do. It’s complicated and not for you to worry about. If it is meant to be, it will be and Heaven help me when you two get together against me. I’ll not stand a chance.” He chuckled.

“If she’s as wonderful as you say she is, that’s true, you won’t stand a chance. A chance of being alone.”

That’s right, my Bug, my heart will never be alone again now that I have you and hopefully my Stacy, too.

Macy wasn’t been shy at all. She spoke her mind freely and without regret. He learned so much about her that night. He learned that Sam had taught her about her roots, his roots. All he could guess was his mother must’ve told her. Sam had confessed that she had been in touch with his mother. That was one of the most painful confessions of it all,go figure. The fact his mother knew where his daughter was years ago, yet opted not to tell him, hurt like a bitch. With her addiction and brain damage, there was a good chance she didn’t remember half the time, but still, it stung.

Dax learned how intuitive and wise Macy was. It was a little scary to see such a young person in touch with everything around them. Sam had done a good job, despite how it came to be and her issues, she did well.

Her favorite school year, fourth grade. Favorite color, black. Favorite food, steak, well done, and the “size of her face.” Favorite animal, all of them. Favorite music, an eclectic mix that ranged from heavy metal staples to jazz.What she wanted to be when she grew up…a lawyer.Yep, a lawyer.The two ladies in his life would get alongjustfine.

He snuggled her close and they relaxed, letting the emotional exhaustion take over, wrapped in each other’s arms, and it was a feeling Dax was grateful for. To be a Dad again was just, indescribable.

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