“So… I can have him?” she asked hopefully.
“Yes. If you give me back the armband, he’s all yours.”
The girl threw her arms around my neck to hug me. “Oh, thank you, thank you! I’ll take really good care of him. I promise.”
“He needs a friend to play with, too. You can tell him all your secrets, and he’ll never say a word. If you take care of him well and play with him outside, I promise you two will be the best of friends.” I sniffed, doing my best to hold it in as I hugged her back. “He’s… he’s a good boy. You’ll see.”
“Trade ya!” She drew away and placed Ava’s armband in my palm. I was glad to have the armband back in my possession, but I was heartbroken to give up Sprigs.
The merry-go-round slowed. Sprigs jumped down, swaying one way and the other like he was dizzy. I plucked him up off the ground, and he steadied in my palm.
“You’re going to live with this child now, Sprigs,” I told him, shattered. “Thank you for being a good friend to me. Now you get to make another one.”
He clapped his leafy hands together in delight. I couldn’t be sure he understood that he wasn’t coming back, but he seemed really happy to have a child to play with. This was the right decision. For him and for her, even if it wasn’t for me.
I placed Sprigs into the little girl’s hand, whispering, “Goodbye, little buddy.”
The girl took off, laughing as Sprigs joined in with a little squeal.
Oberi nudged his nose into my leg. You did the right thing.
I placed Ava’s armband in my pocket to keep it secure. “I know.”
We walked away from the playground, and Kallie laid a hand on my shoulder. “That was the most selfless thing I’ve ever seen you do.”
“Yeah, well.” I wiped my face, not caring she’d seen me cry. “It was for the best. He doesn’t deserve to be locked up in my room all day. He should be free, even if it hurts me to let him go.”
“You’ve really changed, Charlie Wahkin,” Kallie said. “Are you going to be okay?”
I swallowed and cleared my throat. “Sprigs will have a good life with that kid, and I need to be okay with that.”
I forced myself to leave Sprigs behind, turning my attention to other matters. “Anyway. Thinking about how much I miss him isn’t going to help me move forward. I just want to focus on getting Ava’s things back. She said she didn’t need all her old clothes, but I need to get her something, because she can’t keep wearing the same dress every day.”
Kallie perked up. “Does that mean we’re going shopping?”
“Yes, we’re going shopping.”
Oberi started jumping up and down. Hooray! I can’t wait to help you find all of Ava’s new things!
We headed in the direction of the mall. I needed Kallie’s help to pick out the right clothes for Ava, because I didn’t want to buy anything she didn’t like. I ran my fingers over the fabric of at least a hundred dresses, knowing the majority of them would bunch and feel uncomfortable in her chair, while Kallie gave commentary on how the color would complement Ava’s skin tone. My wife needed something soft and unrestrictive.
None of this was working. We went to six different shops and hadn’t found anything suitable. Unlike before, people were ignoring me in the mall— mostly, because of my bad reputation in throwing that coup, but we couldn’t stay here all day. I wanted to be waiting for Ava whenever she got back, but at this rate, we hadn’t found a single dress.
“It was easy to shop for her the last time we came here. Why is it so hard now?” I asked, feeling frustrated. If I couldn’t do this for Ava, that threadbare dress would eventually fall off, and she’d be forced to go around naked.
Not a thought that I hated, but I didn’t want to make her feel cold or uncomfortable.
“Because she hadn’t been out of prison in two years and went crazy on a shopping spree, but honestly, most of those clothes she got didn’t fit her well,” Kallie said. “She struggled to put so many of them on. Most of her choices were stuff she wore before she became paraplegic, so a lot of it didn’t work with her chair. She hadn’t learned how to shop for her disability yet.”
I’d noticed. I had helped her dress most days before we’d separated, but since I’d broken our bond, I hadn’t aided her in getting ready once. Though she’d moved back in, she still wasn’t at a place where she was comfortable with me helping her dress again, and I didn’t want her to feel forced to ask for help, from me or the servants. She didn’t like people touching her body, and was insanely independent, but at the same time, it was difficult for her to dress herself. We needed a solution to this problem.
“Is there an easier way that Ava can get dressed without having to deal with all these complicated outfits?” I asked Kallie as we waited in line at a local coffee bar. Ava could slip stuff over her head, but pulling on pants was all but impossible for her without help.
“There must be.” Kallie grabbed her drink. I went to leave, but she snagged me by the jacket and held me in place. “Wait.”
What exactly were we standing around for? I waited for something to happen, but wasn’t expecting it when she shoved a cold drink into my hands. “Here.”
I blinked. “You didn’t have to?—”
