Page 23 of Holiday Grief

“I’d love for her to make you chicken and have dinner with us, but she can't. Not tonight.” Maybe not any night but he wasn’t going to say that to his daughter.

“Please.”

Adam smiled ruefully. “Please doesn’t work all the time, pumpkin.”

“Can it work this time?”

“Come here, baby.” Pushing away from the kitchen table where he’d been working while Claire drew, he reached over and picked up his little girl, setting her on his lap. “It’s not that Jasmine doesn’t like you anymore or wants to make you sad or even angry. Jasmine had something bad happen to her, and she just needs some time to think about it.”

“Something bad?” Claire asked.

“Someone hurt her, and sometimes after we get hurt, we get scared of being hurt again. Like, remember when you were on the swing and you forgot to hold on and fell off? After that, you were scared to go on the swing again for a long time.”

“But, Daddy, you made me go back on the swing. You said if you fall off the giraffe, you got to get right back on,” Claire told him, giving him a smug look like she was pleased with herself.

“Horse, pumpkin,” he said, chuckling at her substituting her favorite animal.

“I like giraffes better. They have long necks so theys can see everywhere.”

“I didn't make you get back on right away though,” he reminded her.

“But you did make me. You said you’d given me nuff time and I had to face my scareds.”

“I said that, huh?” he asked thoughtfully.

“Uh-huh, that’s what you said, and you're a daddy so you knows everything.”

“Hmm,” he said as his mind spun with ideas. He had given Jasmine time to figure things out on her own, maybe she needed a little push. She’d opened up a bit with him about her relationship with her family, and he knew she kept her distance because she thought they wouldn’t love her if they knew the truth about her.

That they also kept their distance reinforced her ideas.

Convinced her that she wasn’t worth their effort.

Was him giving her too much space showing her the same thing?

“I guess we could call Jasmine, just say hi, tell her you drew her this beautiful picture.”

“We’s playing the piano,” Claire informed him. “Jassy still has to teached me to play songs.”

“Let’s call her and tell her.” Grabbing his cell phone from the counter, he lifted Claire up and set her down then put the phone on speaker. Jasmine likely wouldn’t answer, but at least she’d get the message.

“Jassy!” Claire said excitedly when her voicemail picked up. “I drew you a picture. It’s you and me, and we’re playing piano. You still got to give me lessons.” There was a reprimand to Claire’s tone that made him smile.

“We miss you, green eyes. Both of us. We hope you're okay, and we hope you know how much we care about you.”

“And we loves you,” Claire added.

“And we love you,” he echoed, hoping Jasmine knew that even though this was the first time he’d said it out loud he’d felt this way for a long time now. “We’re not letting you get away, are we, pumpkin?”

“Nope. Because Jassy is ours and we’re hers.”

“Couldn’t have said it better myself. We’ll talk soon, green eyes. Love you. Bye.”

“Bye, I love you!” Claire chimed in before he ended the call. “I was a good match girl,” she said proudly.

“A match girl?”

“You said match girls help people fall in love,” Claire explained.

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