He starts to smile. “Griffin usually heads over about an hour before.”
He leaves, and I run to my room to get dressed in something presentable. If I’m going to give my heart to someone who might have no choice but to crush it, I’m at least going to look good while I do it.
24
Griffin
Ineed to get my head into hockey. I need to focus. But I can’t stop thinking about Charlie. She stayed over last night, and we had a good time. We watched a movie. I have become an expert in cartoon movies, and I didn’t think she’d seenBraveyet, but I thought she might like it.
She didn’t just like it, she adored it. Her eyes were like saucers the entire movie, and she squealed with delight and cackled with laughter, and it made my heart feel so much better than it has. I asked her what she loved about the movie.
“Merida has hair like me,” she said with a ear-to-ear grin. “And she likes tough stuff like I do, not boring stuff. Dad, I wanna bow and arrow.”
I’d guessed that was coming. “How about I talk to your mom and find you some archery classes. Nobody’s getting arrows and bows without training.”
“That would be so cool!” She clapped her hands and then bounced on the couch as if a thought had just exploded inside her. “Oh! And I love that she has a horse!”
The minute she says it I think of Sadie. Her love of horses. The amazing time we had. How much I miss her. I regret not getting a copy of that picture of us she took. God, she looked so beautiful that evening. Did I tell her that? God, I miss her.
“Daddy?” Charlie prompted because I had zoned out. “I know you can’t get me a horse. It can’t live on a boat. But I’d be okay with a dog that looks like a horse.”
I grinned at her. “Of course you would.”
And then I tickled her to change the subject.
But ever since that moment, I haven’t been able to shake two strong feelings: how much I miss Sadie and how much I love Charlie—and how cruel it feels that the second thing is causing the first thing. I’ll never leave my daughter. It’s a simple, undeniable truth that if she moves to New York, I’m moving too. But I know, without a shadow of a doubt, that I’m leaving behind the best relationship I’ll never have.
A knock at the door startles me as I’m pulling my suit out of the closet to get ready for tonight’s game. I walk over to the glass French doors that open to the balcony and look out. I can’t see anyone, so I open the doors and step out. I am leery about just going down and opening the door, worried it’s another fucking private detective or some other bullshit. Right now I’m likely to snap at a Girl Scout selling cookies I’m so tense.
I can’t see who it is, but what I do see is a giant, inflatable, metallic unicorn balloon. My heart stutters in my chest. The only person who would bring me that is…
“Sadie?” I call out tentatively.
Suddenly she’s looking up at me. She looks un-fucking-believable in a little flowered summer dress, with her hair wavy and loose around her shoulders, and her lips are a perfect deep shade of red. She gives me a sheepish smile. “Can we talk?”
“Of course.” I head back inside and downstairs as fast as I can without losing my towel. As soon as I open the door, I regret not taking a second to throw on real clothing. She looks even better up close, and I am already fighting not to get hard. She hands me the balloon.
“I know. It’s stupid, but there was a balloon vendor we passed in the Presidio, and I made the Lyft driver stop and I ran back and got him,” she explains, almost tripping over her words. “I know it’s silly, but I’m silly. And weird. And wild.”
“I know,” I reply, taking the balloon from her. “And it’s only half of what makes you amazing.”
“But I’m actually kind of stupid too,” she confesses. “And very, very, very messed up right now. I mean…I’m a daddy’s girl. We all are. I stupidly thought he would be around for decades. Because he deserved to see us grow up. We’re adults, but not really.”
I smile at that, because I can relate. When Charlie was born I was amazed at how young and unprepared I felt. I sometimes still have moments where I feel like I’m not adult enough to babysit a kid, let alone have one of my own. I think about how I’ve called my parents in those moments and relied on them. How they were there for me during my divorce with kind words and support. “I don’t think we’re ever adult enough to lose a parent.”
“True, and I also think, now, that I’m also never going to be whole enough to ensure I can handle heartbreak,” she announces, and my heart sinks like a stone. I have no idea why she is here, but it was beginning to feel like she wanted to be together, but now…”Pushing away someone you’re falling in love with because of something that might not happen is stupid. I don’t want to be stupid anymore.”
“You’re falling in love with me?” I whisper roughly as I let the balloon go. Her sky-blue eyes follow it as it rises to the ceiling before she lets them land back on my face.
“You’re a unicorn. It’s impossible not to,” she replies softly, nervousness making her voice tremble a little bit. “Which is terrifying, for the record.”
“It’s okay, I’ve got you,” I reply and cup the side of her face. “I’ll fall with you.”
She looks like she might cry, but she doesn’t. Instead she jumps me. Literally. Before I can blink she’s got her arms wrapped around my neck, her legs wrapped around my waist, and her lips on mine. I stumble but kiss her back with everything in me. This incredible, wild, uncontrollable warrior of a woman is giving herself to me, and I am not going to stop her.
The kiss is exactly what I didn’t know I needed. Just like Sadie herself. I walk us toward the living room. My towel is slipping lower and lower and I don’t care. I carry her up the staircase and into my bedroom.
“Stop me if you want to,” I murmur against the column of her throat. She responds by reaching down and curling her fingers into my towel at my hip and yanking it off. She drops it somewhere on the stairs.
