Page 70 of Home Field Advantage
Turning to face Sage, she beams. She has my phone, which means she responded to Poppy. Lifting her chin in the air, and a smile so wide that her eyes are almost shut. I can’t be mad at her for it; I just wish I were a little more prepared.
“Stay. Stay. Stay,” Sage begs with her hands together in prayer. “Pretty please. Daddy makes the best pancakes.”
“It does smell great, but I should get going.”
“You should stay,” I say quickly before she runs out like she did the last time she was here.
Poppy looks from me, to Sage, to the food scattered across the table before her emerald eyes find mine again. The hairs on my arms stand tall, and my body shivers with chills. I can’t remember a single time when a woman looked at me that mademe feel this much, this intensely. I want to blame it on witnessing every little interaction she’s had with my daughter. I want to blame it on the sparks I remember from touching her as I guided her out of Sage’s room that night.
But it’s all her.
It’s all Poppy.
There’s no use denying it anymore.
Fuck everything I’ve said about how I can’t do this, because I want to do this.
When someone feels something this strongly, it’s the universe pushing you in that direction; your gut is waving the green flag that this is right.
“I’m not opposed to begging,” I say with the corner of my lip twisted in a lopsided grin.
“Okay,” she whispers. “I’ll stay for breakfast.”
“Yay!” Sage says, bouncing in her seat with a mouthful of pancakes. “You’re going to love all of it. It’s so good.”
She takes a seat across from Sage. I only have two chairs at the small table, but I don’t mind standing. Besides, it’ll give me the opportunity to look at Poppy.
“I brought you this puzzle,” she tells Sage, handing it over to her.
“A thousand pieces?” Sage asks. “That’s a lot. It’s going to take me five hundred days to finish this.”
Poppy laughs. “No, it won’t. I promise. Your mom told me you can finish a five-hundred-piece puzzle in two nights. I believe in you.”
She chuckles. “Do you do a lot of puzzles, Poppy?”
“Every night.”
“Every night? That’s alotof puzzles.”
Poppy laughs. “I don’t finish it all in one night, most of the time. I keep it on a small table in my living room, which is specifically designed for puzzles, and every night before I go to bed, I work on it a little at a time. Plus, it relaxes me. I have trouble turning my brain off most of the time, so focusing on apuzzle with either a TV show in the background or music helps me turn off my brain for a bit.”
“Wouldn’t it be so cool if there were a switch on the side of our head, and we could just flip it on or off whenever we wanted to? On. Off. On. Off,” Sage says, pretending to flip an imaginary one.
“That would be great.” Poppy chuckles, prompting Sage to laugh, too. “Since that isn’t real, puzzles do the trick for me.”
“Sometimes I have trouble turning off my brain, too,” Sage admits. Alarm bells ring in my head because she’s never told me this before, and April has never mentioned this.
I stand there, with my plate in my hand, chewing on the piece of bacon I made as I listen in on this conversation. It’s the first time since being in Bluestone Lakes that Sage has really opened up more than just surface level.
This conversation has only ignited some dad-guilt in me.
Guilt for all the years I put baseball before her.
Guilt for not taking more initiative to learn the things that go through my daughter’s head.
So. Much. Fucking. Guilt.
“Dad, can I be excused to go do this puzzle in the living room?”
