This was comfortably familiar. Sitting with her in our cozy family room in the otherwise quiet house was soothing. I was content to listen to her sweet voice and used it to avoid deeper thoughts that weren’t at all soothing.
When the movie was over, I cleaned up our popcorn mess while she got ready for bed. I went into her room to tuck her in and found her in bed but dressing her Barbie doll in her wedding gown.
“It’s time for lights out, bug,” I told her.
“I’m almost done. Barbie’s having a wedding tomorrow.”
“Shouldn’t she wait until tomorrow to put on her wedding dress?”
Addie shook her head, focused on her task. “She doesn’t want to miss the wedding.”
I summoned my patience while she finished. I held out my hand for the doll.
“I need to put her in her bed. Tomorrow’s a big day for her,” Addie said, scampering over to her Barbie condo.
I bit down on any comments about how the dress would get ruined in bed, unwilling to contribute to my daughter’s bedtime stalls.
She crawled back under her blankets, and I bent over to kiss her. She wrapped her arms around my neck.
“Love you, Daddy.”
“Love you, Addie.” We both grinned at our nightly rhyme.
As I was straightening, I spotted an eyelash on her cheek. I gently brushed it onto my finger.
“An eyelash,” I said quietly. “Make a wish and blow it away.”
She closed her eyes for two seconds as if silently wishing, then opened them and blew the lash off my fingers with all the gusto of a six-year-old.
As I turned off the lamp on her nightstand, she said, “Know what I wished for, Daddy?”
“Aren’t you supposed to keep your wish to yourself?”
She shrugged. “I wished for you to get married.”
My brows shot up my forehead, likely to my hairline. “Why’s that, bug? We do okay with you, me, and Pops, don’t we? Plus your mom.”
Jessie was deployed overseas, so she wasn’t around much, but she faithfully called Addie as often as she could and spent most of her leave each year with her daughter.
“We do okay,” she said authoritatively. “But you should get a wedding and a happy ever after.”
My heart swelled with love for this little girl who’d used her wish for me. “You’re a sweet girl, but I don’t see that happening any time soon.”
“Mommy wasn’t the right one for you.”
“She was the right one to give us you.”
“Don’t you want another wife?”
“I wouldn’t mind having one if she’s the right one.”
She scrunched her face in thought. “How can you find the right one?”
I laughed quietly. “I wish I knew, bug.”
The truth was, I longed for a partner to share my life with, to build a future with. While each of the other guys in my dads’ group had been staunchly against relationships, love had fallen into their laps. I was over here wishing for someone, and here I was, the last single guy standing.
Irony was a bitch.
