Tyler looked shocked at his daughter’s response. His head lifted, and Kaiya read an apology from his eyes. She shrugged and turned to the little girl.
“Hi, Lili. I’m happy to—”
“Could we please go now, Daddy? I’m starving.”
Kaiya felt a flush of tears in her eyes which she rapidly beat away. The day wasn’t going as planned. She lifted her head to stare at the man whose face had become stiff.
“Alright, Pumpkin. But you must first apologize to Kaiya. It’s not only wrong but rude when you cut someone off while they’re still talking.”
Lowering her head, the little girl said, “I’m sorry, Kaiya.”
“It’s fine, Lili,” Kaiya replied in a small voice.
“Go grab your jacket,” Tyler demanded quietly.
Lili hurried to get her jacket from the closet while Kaiya marveled at the beautiful pink dress her daughter had on. She no longer felt she was overdressed.
Tyler had suggested they have a day out before returning to the house to tell Lili the truth about her parentage. Kaiya was all for it. Lili had to be put in the right mood to receive her. The little girl was always cheerful, except today something was off about her.
Tyler took hold of her hand and squeezed it. “I’m sorry about that,”
“It’s alright. From what I’ve seen so far, Tyler, you did a good job raising our little girl,” Kaiya confessed with a lot of emotion. He thanked her just as Lili returned.
***
Tyler drove them to a nice Italian restaurant in Downtown. Lili ordered some pasta; Kaiya wanted mushroom risotto, while Tyler had bacon and lamb lasagna.
“So, Lili, is pasta your favorite meal?” Kaiya asked as a way of striking a conversation with her daughter while they waited for their meal.
“Yes,” Lili simply replied without lifting her head from the menu.
“My mom prepared it a lot when she was younger,” Tyler explained on his daughter’s behalf.
“What about your favorite subject in school?”
“Math.”
“You must have inherited that from your dad. When I met him, he was reading through a book of equations.” Kaiya looked over at Tyler, and he winked, Kaiya responded with a smile. Lili never raised her head.
“Have you made any friends at school?”
Lili didn’t reply because the waiter chose that moment to bring their order. When the man left, she dived into her food, ignoring Kaiya.
After a few more questions in which Lili either answered in monosyllables or kept quiet completely, Kaiya gave up. Tyler answered his daughter’s questions when she chose to keep silent.
Through Tyler, she found out that her daughter also liked engaging in arts and crafts just like her. She also discovered other interesting things about the little girl. Kaiya tried to ignore the fact that the little girl seemed to resent her, but she couldn’t. Something was wrong. Perhaps she didn’t like the fact that they were hanging out outside her dance classes. Kaiya didn’t know what to do anymore as all the efforts she made to draw the cheerful little girl out failed. She even went as far as telling her how frightened she was of snakes and anything that crawled, hoping Lili would tell her what frightened her too and they could have a connection from there.
Kaiya was a little bit relieved when the lunch date was over. She couldn’t wait to get home to cry out her eyes for the horrible fact that her daughter didn’t like her.
“Can we please go to the mall?” Lili begged when they got inside Tyler’s car.
“The mall? Why?” Tyler turned in his driver’s seat to regard his daughter with questioning eyes.
Shrugging, the little girl replied, “I want to show Kaiya my favorite cat at the pet store.”
Kaiya blew her daughter a kiss, happy that she wanted to do something with her.
“I love cats,” Kaiya mentioned, but Lili didn’t say anything to that.
