“Come on,” I say, holding my hand out to her. “Let’s go back to the kid’s section and you can find something there.”
But she tucks her hands behind her back and sidles around me, making her own way.
I settle into place on the throne while she finishes her shopping. When she finds something she likes, she bounces across to show me. “Yeah?” I trace out the dragon on the cover and smile. “You’re sure this is the one?”
Her eyes dart back to the shelves, seeking something better, concerned she’s missing out, then she nods and turns back to me.
“You want me to read it to you tonight?”
“Now.”
“Not now, sweetie.” I pull her onto my lap and bounce her, my eyes fixed on the window and the way anybody walking past could see me struggle. “But later.”
“Now,” she says in a lower tone and if Nadia was here, she’d laugh her arse off because that’s exactly the same voice I use on her.
It’s one of the unexpected delights of raising a child. Seeing what she picks up from me or what I can blame on her mother. Noticing the increasing number of mannerisms that are uniquely hers, springing up from goodness knows where.
“Don’t you want to sit and look at the pictures while we wait for Mum?”
A crease between her eyebrows tells me that’s currently her least favourite option.
“Okay,” I concede, giving up the battle. At least there’s no one else here apart from the store owner, and he’s hardly likely to make his regular customers feel shabby.
To be fair, most of my battles with Leilani end this way. Nadia’s far better at insisting she toe the line like she’s freakishly immune to batting eyelids and the sucking thumb of helplessness.
“Once upon a time,” I say as she snuggles back against my arm, her sleepy eyes scanning the street outside as often as they scan the pictures. “There was a l-o-n-e”—I sound out the letters, feeling my cheeks warm a little until I grasp the word—“lonely d-r-a-”
“Dragon!”
“Dragon,” I repeat, scanning the full page of text to see which words I recognise, adding context to help with the ones I don’t immediately understand. There’s gold. There’s a cave. There’s always the art of making things up on the spot if I truly can’t work it out.
I settle farther back in the throne, still bouncing Leilani so she doesn’t lose interest and run off somewhere new before I can catch her.
The deeper we get into the story, the more I act scenes out for her benefit. Her favourite is the warlock pose, fingers curled over ready to do her damage, an imaginary stick being waved as I cast a spell that she doesn’t seem the slightest bit worried could turn her into a toad.
A few people wander in and out of the store, another two children joining the mat in front of me before I stumble to the end.
The girl and boy are both carrot-tops, the young woman hovering nearby obviously their mother, with her auburn curls pulled back in a messy ponytail.
“Are you going to be doing the readings again tomorrow?” she asks with far more interest than she should, given my fumbling recitation. “I think Nellie’s got a crush on you.”
She waves at her daughter but judging from the girl’s dubious interest compared to her mother’s appreciative gaze, I think she might have misidentified exactly what crush belongs to whom.
“No. Just filling in time for today,” I say, nodding politely but standing and shuffling away from the fancy chair.
Leilani grabs my hand and tugs me to the counter. When I put the book down, she wrinkles her nose. “But we’ve read that one.”
I cross my eyes at Gibson who smiles as he rings up the purchase. “I should probably try to upsell you now,” he says as he hands the bag over. “But I’ll let you away with it this time.”
“You’re local?” the woman asks, glancing over from the middle of the store.
I nod again, feeling awkward as I check the time and see Nadia’s not due for another ten minutes. Then she slams through the door, hair wild, cheeks bright from the wind, and Leilani claps and runs over, lifting her arms to be picked up as though her legs don’t work at all.
“Oh, looks like someone is grandma’s favourite.”
I wince but my wife doesn’t challenge the assumption. She rests Lei Lei on her hip, deftly supporting her while our daughter rattles off all the excitement of the morning in exhaustive detail.
“Daddy read for you?” she double checks, glancing over with her crooked smile while I nod, and she beams. The expression does something interesting to my insides and suddenly I have an increased sense of urgency about getting home.
