Page 22 of Conquer
“Okay.” I can take a hint—an off-limits topic. For now. “I’m sorry if I upset you. We don’t have to talk about anything you don’t want to.”
To cement our truce, I stroke her back until her posture relaxes, and she starts to kick her legs again.
Sensing another opportunity, I decide to aim for a seemingly safer topic next. “I heard you singing a song,” I add carefully, easing my fingers through her braid. This approach seems to land with less of a defensive reaction. “Where did you learn it?”
She shrugs and kicks her legs out before her one by one. “It was always in my head. After I woke up, I mean. It’s nice.”
And the man who spent ten straight days singing it to her still has no clue just how much it meant to her. How muchhemeant to her.
“I don’t want to come in between you and your dad,” I tell her, my voice thick. Only belatedly do I realize that it’s the first time I referred to Vadim’s identity out loud in explicit terms.
She stiffens, but says nothing, still peeling her orange.
“I don’t want you to think I’m trying to pretend to be your mother, either,” I add, though I’m not sure why I feel the need to say it. Maybe for my own peace of mind? “But I’ll be here, no matter what you need from me. Always. You’re stuck with me, kiddo—” I nudge her with my elbow. “Whether you like it or not.”
She carefully works away the last bit of her orange peel. Then she takes the sizeable remainder of fruit and shoves it into her mouth. Her cheeks bulge, barely able to contain it, and I make a show of fussing over her, swiping at her face with the end of my shirt.
“Messy girl!”
We break into laughter, so loud and raucous that I don’t notice my father returning until he sets a crate of ripe fertilizer right at our feet. I cringe, but Magda lurches upright, her gaze inquisitive.
“Is that animal feces?” she asks, with awe coloring her voice rather than the disgust I think would be standard for a girl of her age. “Like cow poop?”
“Genuine, goddamn cow shit,” Daddy says with a chuckle. “Don’t go repeating that. This stuff we put on the flowers though, not in the vegetable garden. But it makes the flowers bloom really nice, especially those damn crotchety lilies.”
Magda listens to him wide-eyed, absorbing every detail. When she looks up and spots my expression, she giggles. “It’s like plant food,” she explains, revealing a hint of her intellect. “It contains nutrients and microbes that help them grow.”
“Right you are, Missy,” Daddy says. “Why don’t you come with me and we’ll sprinkle this around. Let’s let Tiffy go get some rest—” he shoots me an apologetic glance. “You look wrecked, sweetheart.”
“Thanks, Daddy…”
Considering that both parents have mentioned my appearance in a negative way, I decide to take the hint and enter the house, heading up for my old room. In so many ways, it’s just as I left it. Juvenile—decorated in shades of bright pink—childish, and superficial. The girl who once slept beneath this frothy, bubblegum-colored canopy spent her final nights here dreaming of what life would be like as Mrs. James Walker. Boy, what a letdown that turned out to be.
Nearly ten years later and this Tiffy has learned her lesson. Dreaming is for fools. But even as I strip my clothing, change into a nightgown, and crawl beneath my old hot pink comforter, a man sneaks into my head regardless.
His presence is more consuming than Jim could ever hope to be.
He’s insistent, promising me the world…
But all I seem capable of doing is spitting onto his hand.
