I don’t want to take her phone away from her every night, but I know she’ll sleep better if I do. Or maybe she’d be like this anyway after adjusting to a new school and sitting on the sidelines most of the soccer season.
“If you could build your perfectawakeday, what would it be?” I ask.
One brown eyeball slides open and peers at me. “Anything?”
This is a trap. “I’m curious what you want to do.”
She stares a beat longer, and for three seconds, she’s six again. Open and vulnerable and trusting that whatever she wants, I can make happen.
“I want to get a dog,” she says.
“Like a circus dog?”
“Mom.”
I bite back the questions.Can you care for a dog? What would the dog do while you’re at school? Do you know what kind of shots and medicine dogs need? A big dog or a little dog? Will you train the dog? Will it sleep with you? Who’ll take care of it?
God, I feel for Charlotte so much right now. When she told us her ex was getting a dog for the kids, we all knew.
We knew.
We knew he’d drop it with her, even though she doesn’t have room forone more thing, because that’s what they always do.
And now Junie wants a dog, which isone more thing, but for her, I’ll do anything.
“I thought you didn’t like dogs,” I say quietly, which is the truth. She had a bad experience when she was little and hasn’t asked for one, or even talked about dogs, ever since.
She grunts.
I put a hand on the blanket covering her calf. “What kind of dog?”
“Never mind.”
“Junie. C’mon. What kind of dog would you get?”
“Not practical,” she mutters.
“What’s not practical about a dog?”
“College.”
Hello, knife. That’s my heart you’re getting a little too close to.
She’s right.
If I get her a dog, what happens when she goes to college in two years?
Do I keep the dog? Does she take the dog with her? Could I handle losing a dogandmy daughter? Could I handle keeping her dog and making her separate herself from it?
Oh God.
She’s leaving me. I have literalmonthsleft. Like,twenty. Maybetwentymonths left with my daughter before she leaves me.
“Stop it,” she mumbles.
“Stop what?”
“Panicking.”
