Anna looks at me, her brow puckering into a frown. Does she see right through me? Can kids do that?
She turns back to the dollhouse, and I assume I’ve been dismissed by the smallest human I know, when she spins back around, holding a doll. “For you,” she says as she hands me a male doll.
“For me?” I gingerly take the doll.
“You be daddy,” she says, before she turns back to the doll house.
But I nearly choke on my own spit as I look down at the doll in my hand, a muscle in my jaw ticcing. “I’m not sure I’m father material,” I mutter, holding the doll like it’s something foul. Like it might leave a stain.
“It’s only for a few minutes,” Sasha says with a small smile. “I promise, you won’t catch any paternal disease.”
“How do you know?” I mutter, but I sit on the floor.
Her eyes go wide as they stare into mine. From the child-sized table in the other corner, Ava clears her throat and then stands. “I’ll let the three of you enjoy yourselves.”
I nod in her general direction as I am instructed to put the “daddy” doll in his office to do work.
I do as I’m commanded, because for one, working is a task I actually understand, and two, I’m pretty sure that means I don’t have to participate much in the pretend doll world.
But soon an entire dollhouse drama unfolds, where the mom and the daughter come knock on daddy’s door and demand he leave work to take them out for ice cream. A word Anna pronouncespema.
“Is pema Russian for ice cream?” I whisper to Sasha.
“No, just her mispronunciation,” Sasha says as she softly laughs.
I came in here to watch my wife with her niece and ask myself a few hard questions. But instead, I find myself playing for the first time in at least twenty years. The innocence of this moment is an answer of a different kind, but no less powerful.
Naturally, I have no choice but to concede, as doll daddy, I agree to the outing. What kind of ogre denies a child that cute ice cream?
But I’m a little shocked when Anna slips her hand in mine and starts pulling me up and out into the kitchen.
Sasha is quietly laughing behind me as she trails behind.
“Where are we going?” I ask Anna.
“Pema,” she chirps as we cross through the living room.
Dimitri sits at the table with his laptop. “Did you promise her ice cream?” he asks, giving me what I hope is a mock scowl.
“I thought I was only agreeing as daddy doll. I didn’t realize…”
“Rookie mistake,” he rumbles, but I see the smile pulling at his lips as Anna tugs at the freezer door, not strong enough to get it to open.
As if I’m acting with someone else’s body, I pull it open for her. “Chocolate,” she chirps, pointing at the shelf.
I grab the container, knowing I’ve been taken hostage by a little angel. But if Sasha had made me look at things differently, Anna…
“Only a little,” Dimitri warns as Sasha pulls out a bowl and a spoon. I scoop a single scoop into a bowl and hand it to Anna.
She crosses to the table and sets the bowl down, then waves me forward.
“Me?” I ask, looking at Sasha.
“Go,” she whispers with a wink as she puts the lid back on the ice cream. I do, not sure why, except that being with Anna feels like I’m seeing a completely different version of myself.
She points to the chair, and I slide in. Without ceremony, she climbs up into my lap and then pulls the bowl over.
And just like that, the four-year-old little angel eats ice cream from my lap.
