CHAPTER 1
ILAY
It’s six days before Valentine's Day and I am standing in my kitchen at five forty-seven in the morning squeezing oranges into the juicer while the machine whirs and pulp collect in the strainer. Warm morning light shine through our floor to ceiling windows illuminating the clean white marble tiles as I add two red apples, cored and sliced, since Iris refuses to drink anything with the green ones in it.
The bacon sizzles in the pan and I flip the strips carefully, making sure they come out golden and crisp the way she likes them. On the counter sit six carefully cut heart-shaped pancakes for my wife. The watermelon is cubed and chilling in the freezer since she likes it solid and cold instead of juiced.
I arrange everything on the steel tray with the juice in the crystal glass she got from her grandmother, the bacon on the white plate, the pancakes stacked with strawberries on top, and the watermelon in the small blue bowl with the chipped edge that she refuses to throw away.
I carry the tray up the stairs carefully and push open the bedroom door with my shoulder, and there she is, my wife, sprawled across the bed in her little nightdress with her red hair fanned across the pillow, the soft glow of the lights I installed because she doesn’t like to wake up to sunlight illuminating her gorgeous face. And on top of her, using her stomach as a mattress, is my three-year-old daughter Anya in a Donald Duck nightgown.
She must have crawled in here after I got up to make breakfast. She was not here when I left the bed an hour ago.
I set the tray down on the bedside table and move to pick her up, and the second my hands touch her little body she squirms and kicks and makes a noise like a disgruntled cat.
"No," she mumbles while still half asleep. "Five more minutes."
"It's Papa," I say quietly.
Her eyes flutter open and those green eyes, Iris's eyes, look up at me with recognition before she stops struggling and wraps her arms around my neck to bury her face in my shoulder.
"Papa," she breathes while already falling back asleep against me. "You smell like pancakes."
"That's how it is when you make pancakes."
She hums and nuzzles deeper and goes completely limp in my arms.
I adjust her weight against my hip and lean down to press a kiss to Iris's forehead, and her eyes open slowly with that sleepy confusion that I never get tired of seeing.
"Breakfast, baby," I murmur.
She inhales and her nose twitches and a smile curves across her lips before she is even fully awake.
"Mmm." She stretches and arches her back. "I was wondering what smelt so nice."
"Eat up." I watch her sit up and pull the tray onto her lap. "You came home so late last night that I was worried about you."
Her expression shifts. "Yeah, the case has been driving me insane. That man is not budging at all and my client is frustrated and I'm frustrated, and everyone is frustrated."
"Don't stress too much about it," I say while still holding our sleeping daughter. "You know you can always decide to take on smaller cases."
Her eyes flash. "Don't go there again. You already know that when I set my mind to something I have to do it."
I laugh and lean down to kiss her. "That's what I love about you."
She softens just a little. "I love you so much."
"I love you too, times a million."
She rolls her eyes but she is smiling. "You know you can just say I love you too normally instead of adding times whatever you're timing."
"I love you times extra, extra, extra, extra, and I can't even say it enough. If I could play it like a broken record for you every day I would."
She shakes her head but that smile is still there, and then she looks up at me still hovering over her. "Get your face out of my face." Then she pauses and notices the small body draped over my shoulder. "I didn't even notice she was with you."
I shift Anya's position on my hip. "She keeps latching onto you these days. She just started preschool and she's adjusting, and sometimes she doesn't want to go, so she just wants to be near us."
"Near you," Iris corrects.
