Page 51 of Doctor Daddy

“No honey.” David waved. “I’ll let you know as soon as it’s ready.”

She shook her head at us and closed the door.

“Are you sure we want to do this?” It was already particularly hot out.

“When that woman has plans, we stick to them.” David pointed at me. “Now if you got married you would know these things.”

I chuckled. “I guess it’s a good thing I’m not married then, isn’t it?”

“What about that mystery girl you’ve been seeing? Does that have the potential to get serious?”

I shrugged it off. I had no idea what happened to Brooke, and I wasn’t about to admit to my brother that I missed her.

“She seems to have disappeared on me.”

“Oh, you broke up?”

“Honestly, I have to assume we have.”

“What is that supposed to mean? Either you broke up or you’re both playing games.”

I held up my hand with a trip twist of my wrist. “It means I don’t exactly know what happened. We were fine one day. And then the next week we weren’t. But she wouldn’t tell me what I had done wrong. And now she seems to just be gone.”

“So, she ghosted you.”

I nodded. “That seems to be the case.”

David shook his head and started to laugh. “I actually didn’t believe you were dating anybody. I thought you were just telling people so they would stop trying to set you up.”

“And now?”

“I actually believe you were just telling people you were dating someone so they would stop setting you up. I get it. Shelly gets an idea, and she latches on. The only way you can get her to let go is to either give in or prove it’s completely futile. The only way to stop her from setting you up is to produce a girlfriend on your own. I figured she was your imaginary girlfriend, and I was just gonna let you do what you were gonna do.”

“Imaginary?”

“Yep. And now, the way you tell me she has left you? Yeah, only you could lose an imaginary girlfriend. So what did you do? Or more realistically, what did you forget to do?”

I shrugged. “I honestly don’t know. I sent her flowers; I followed all your advice.”

“Did you stop sending her flowers? Maybe she disappeared from lack of attention.” David turned his attention back to the grill. “Hand me that paper bag, would you?”

As I handed over the bag he asked for, I thought about that for a moment. Had I stopped wooing Brooke once I got her into bed? I didn’t think I had. I had made a point of finding things that she would like to do; I took her out on dates so that she didn’t think I was only using her for sex. Maybe that had been an assumption on my behalf. Maybe she was just using me for sex, and I was showing far too much interest?

David began scooping ash from the last time he had grilled into the bag.

“Go inside and grab me a beer.”

“I need to grab some food first,” I said.

“Well, grab some food and a beer and get back out here.”

The house was cold and dark by comparison to the bright heat of the outdoors, when I stepped into the kitchen.

“Does David have the grill ready yet?” Shelly asked me.

“We’re getting close. Do you have something that I can eat?” I asked opening the refrigerator. I reached in and pulled out two beers. “I skipped breakfast.”

“I can make a peanut butter sandwich real quick. I just made some for the kids.”

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