by Lily Foster
“Libby, you can sit at my desk while I get this sorted out. And don’t worry, when I was your age I used to get lost all the time. We’ll find your dad, piece of cake.” I smile and snap my fingers before lifting her onto my chair. “How old are you?”
She holds up four fingers and says, “I’m four years old.” I note that she uses I’m four, not I four, and make the uneducated assumption that she’s bright. “And do you know your last name?”
“Libby Hale.” Hmm…A little difficulty annunciating the L, but pretty good. I’m about to tell her to sit tight when she adds, “I live at 246 Grove Circle, Skwell Hill Nort, 15232.”
Damn, she even knows her zip code. “You live in Squirrel Hill North?” She nods. “I love that name! Are there really hills with squirrels running all around?”
“Yes!”
Since she knows the zip code I go for the phone number, but she gets jammed up on the last few digits and then starts to cry again.
“No biggie, Libby. I don’t need the phone number.” I poke my head around the corner. “Diana,” I call out to the department chair’s personal secretary. “If Doctor Thompson comes back,” I lower my voice to a whisper, “tell him I have a lost little girl in my office. I’m going to call the security desk and let them know.”
Diana walks in as I’m on the phone with security. “And who is this little sweetie pie?”
Her tone surprises me in a good way, as this chick is typically all business. I might even use the word icy to describe her. But with Libby she morphs into gushing, smiling granny-mode, and it’s not hard to understand why. Libby is all golden-curled, pink-cheeked sweetness.
Waiting on hold, I hand her a piece of the licorice I keep stashed in my bag, and her eyes light up as she struggles to undo the wrapper.
“Let me get that for you,” Diana all but coos.
Libby frowns a moment later as she rips off a piece of the licorice with her teeth and chews. “I love candy but my daddy doesn’t let me have any.”
“That means he’s a good dad.” I perch my butt on the edge of the desk, wondering why I’ve been on hold for so long. “Candy is a special treat, not for every day.”
Diana adds, “That’s right, candy will ruin those little teeth of yours if you eat it every—”
We all stop in our tracks as the door practically flies off the hinges and some maniac barges into the office followed by Doctor Thompson and another man.
“Where’s Olivia?” the big guy dressed in a leather jacket and jeans barks.
I manage an oh-so articulate uh as I point to Libby, while Diana goes all Momma Bear on him and stands in front of the child like a shield.
His face is red with rage. “Anyone think of maybe keeping her down by the front security desk?”
He’s looking back and forth between me and Diana like he’s waiting for an apology when he should be thanking us.
“I, I did call security…I’m still on hold.”
“Well, while you’ve been on hold, I’ve been tearing through this campus looking for my daughter.”
With that, Libby peeks her head out from behind Diana and says, “Hi, Daddy!” as if she doesn’t have a care in the world and wasn’t crying just a few minutes ago.
His expression changes in a heartbeat. The hard eyes and scowl are exchanged for a teary-eyed smile. Ok, he loves his baby. He’s not a total dick.
“Olivia.” He scoops her up and snuggles her close. “I told you to stay right next to me.” He pulls back a few inches to look her in the eye. “Please don’t ever do that again, ok?”
She rubs the stubble along his jaw with her little hand and pouts. “I won’t. Promise.”
He lets out a deep breath and looks to the man standing beside my boss. “Ed, walk us to the car so we can wrap this up. I don’t have time to trek all the way back to your office.”
Doctor Thompson, my department head, looks between Libby and his colleague, now known as Ed. “She made it all the way here from the engineering campus?”
Ed raises an eyebrow behind Grumpy Dad’s back, as if to tell my boss: Don’t kick the hornet’s nest.
But it’s too tempting, especially since this jerk still hasn’t thanked us or apologized for the way he came barging in here.
“Four-year-olds need eyes on them all the time, right Libby?”
“Right, Sky.” She smiles brightly, waving her floppy licorice wand back and forth at her father like she’s scolding him. I want to jump up and high-five her for the way she delivered that line.
He lets out a harrumph as he sets Libby back down on the floor and takes her hand. “Time to go, baby.” Giving us no more than a fleeting look, he says to her, “Say thank you to the nice ladies who helped us.”
Libby breaks free from his hold and rushes over to me, wrapping her arms tight around my thighs. “Thank you, Sky.”
I crouch down to give her a proper hug back. “You’re welcome, Libby. You can come visit us anytime.”
“What about me?” Diana whines, holding her arms out wide. “I don’t get any sugar?”
I nudge Libby in Diana’s direction, and Libby squeals and laughs when Diana squeezes her tight. “A hug is sugar?”
“Yep,” we say in unison.
I look up to her father and see that his expression has changed again. He looks profoundly sad, or maybe I’ve got it all wrong. Maybe he’s worried, anticipating the wrath he’s going to face when Libby tells her mom what happened here today.
He looks on edge, that’s for sure. And I would be too if my baby girl went missing for what was probably close to half an hour. The mathematics and engineering buildings are halfway across campus.
As the group walks out, he turns back to me and Diana, nodding his head once. I think that’s all we’re going to get but he surprises me when he says, “Thank you for this. You two saved the day.”
Diana doesn’t miss a beat, following after Doctor Thompson to relay his phone messages, but I’m spent. I let out a breath as I collapse back into my chair, trying and failing to make sense of the sadness that’s suddenly weighing me down.
I feel the way he looked: crushed. But for the life of me I can figure out why.
Chapter Ten
Leo
I grip the steering wheel tight in an effort to stop my hands from shaking. Olivia is chatting away, oblivious to the fact that I’m on the verge of a panic attack.
I keep picturing her, a tiny little thing walking amid all those big people, crossing pathways where campus vehicles make the rounds for sanitation and security. It’s not like she crossed a major highway or anything, but she’s four years old. I cannot believe she made it all the way to Foley Hall without anyone stopping her.
I push down thoughts of what could have happened, squeeze my eyes shut at a red light when an image of a man grabbing her and pulling her off to the side pops into my head. The person behind me lays on their horn startling me out of that nightmare, and I find myself talking myself down for the remaining ten minutes of the drive.
I let out a breath when we pull into the driveway, and decide to have a talk with my little runaway while she’s still trapped in her car seat.
“You scared Daddy today. Do you understand that?”
“Sorry, Daddy.”
“Never…You can never walk away from me like that again.”
“But I—”
“No buts. Something bad could have happened. Tell me you understand.”
“Sky says she gets lost all the time.”
That’s one thing I can piece together from the ride home. She must have said the word sky at least twenty times. The girl’s name is Sky. The one who found Olivia and kept her safe.
I acted like an ass, and she let me know it in her own subtle way. Yeah, thinking back on it I was rude, but she’ll get over it.
I hated the way Olivia clung to her, latched onto her like an octopus. I hate that she attaches to strangers so easily. And that’s what’s really eating at me. I’m all she’s got an
d I haven’t been doing a stellar job. Between the shop, my workshop at home and the occasional trips I make for business, I always feel like I’m neglecting her.
Today was a perfect example. Taking her to the engineering lab and expecting her to stay put while I talked shop with Ed for over an hour was the most dumbass thing I’ve ever done. Don’t sell yourself short, my inner voice pipes up, You do stupid shit like that all the time.
The kid has no structure aside from the four hours of preschool she attends three times a week. Her mother, who was not exactly an authority on parenting, wanted her in all-day care from the time she was born but I wasn’t having it.
The school she goes to now is expensive and selective, and they’re all about not pushing full-time schooling until kindergarten. I agree with them in theory, but I’m doing a shit job of making her “exploratory time” enriching and meaningful.
In bed at eight, I’m yawning along with her as I read the last few pages of The Princess and the Pea.
“Is that Sky?” my daughter asks.
Long dark hair, warm brown eyes. I think back to earlier today and have to admit there’s a likeness between the two of them.
“Do you think she looks like her?”
“Yes,” she says with a sleepy smile. “Princesses are nice and they’re really pretty. Sky is pretty and she’s soooo nice.”
Muffling a laugh, I ask, “So she must be a princess?”
“Yes,” she answers on a yawn.
“Time for bed, little one.”
I ease my way out of the bed, kiss Olivia’s forehead and tuck her in. Her eyes are already closed, so I stand there and watch for a few moments. I silently thank that older woman and Sky again, and then make a vow to do better where my daughter is concerned.
Me and Libby against the world. It’s always been that way.
Even when she was around.
I pick the frame up from Olivia’s nightstand, look between the woman behind the glass and the spitting image of her lying curled up in bed.
Yes, my wife was pretty. I’ll give her that. And that’s all I needed at first, I guess. Just getting my business off the ground, I didn’t really take the time to dig deeper, so I’m no innocent bystander in all this. Not even close.
I liked her on my arm, having her as my plus one. I liked falling into bed with her, appreciated her body and the way she moved with me. I just didn’t know any better. Couldn’t define the pit I always had in my stomach afterward when she’d roll out from underneath me, go into the bathroom and close the door. She never looked me in the eye, during the act or after.
We were burning out right around the time she came home drunk from a night out with “friends” and announced she was pregnant. And loving my daughter the way I do, I’m ashamed to admit that I hated her mother in that moment. I didn’t say a word. Didn’t have to. She studied my expression and said, “It’s not like I want to marry you either, but I’m having this baby.”
I used to blame myself. And she piled it on, too. She’d tell me I was the distant one, that I never had time for her, that I ignored her. And for a while there she had me going. So I spent the next seven months trying. Trying to get her to slow down and stop acting like she was still in college. Trying to see the good in her. Trying to ignore the late-night phone calls she answered, making excuses and accusing me of being paranoid when I pressed to know who it was.
Yeah, she was pretty.
But she wasn’t nice.
Chapter Eleven
Skylar
I took the last of my midterms this morning, so I’m officially more than halfway through my first semester here.
Am I still homesick? Yes. Am I lonely? Sometimes. Do I still find myself pining away for Tyler? Hardly ever. And that tells me I made the right decision.
He’s still with Lila from what I hear. Sienna doesn’t offer that up and neither does Garth. That’s strictly grapevine information, or what I gather from idly stalking their pages. It doesn’t hurt, but maybe it does sting a little. I think there will always be some thread connecting me and Tyler, a first love kind of thing. But I’m pretty sure it’s my friend who I’m missing, not my boyfriend.
Walking home after grabbing a post dance practice beer with my friends, I’m as high as a kite. The endorphins from dancing for ninety minutes straight combined with that one light beer has me feeling euphoric in a silly way.
“Am I calling too late?”
Sienna laughs. “No, weenie, it’s only nine o’clock.”
“I just figured you might be tired.”
“You’re actually more tired in the first trimester. According to the book, I’m supposed to have boundless energy now that I’m in the second trimester.”
“I can’t believe you’re halfway there already.”
“I know. And when you come home for Thanksgiving next week you’re going to be shocked at the size of me. I’m huge!”
“She looks great,” I hear Garth call out from the background.
“Aw,” we say in unison before laughing.
“It’s going to be so weird, right?”
I nod even though she can’t see me. “Our first holiday without them.”
“I drove by the house the other day. It looks like whoever bought the place is taking care of it. There was a fall wreath on the door and pumpkins on the stoop.”
“That makes me really happy for some reason.”
“Me too,” my sister says. “But you’re sounding pretty chipper nowadays anyway.”
“Was I a total Eeyore back in September?”
“Yeah. I’d get weepy every night after we hung up. I wanted to tell you to come home but I knew I couldn’t.”
“I’m glad you didn’t. I would have been packing up my car and speeding back. I mean, it’s still tough some days but I’m starting to settle in.”
“Oh, I almost forgot! Miss Dawson popped in on us the other day to give her condolences and to drop off some baby stuff.”
“She’s the best.”
“She is. She was the best teacher I ever had.”
I nod my head again. “Same for me.”
“Anyway, she told me you joined the dance club up there? What the hell, Sky…You’ve been holding out on me?”
“It’s nothing. She pushed me to sign up so I’d meet some people. And whatever, it’s turned out to be a good thing. I feel totally awkward because some of the girls and the guys…” I trail off, trying to think of a way to do them justice. “Sienna, they dance like they should be on Broadway. I’m serious!”
“I’m sure you’re doing just fine. One thing I know for sure is that the Perillo twins can shake it.”
“Damn straight,” Garth says.
“Is he listening in on this entire conversation?”
When he says, “Damn straight,” again, we both crack up laughing.
“I have period cramps, Garth. Any suggestions?”
“Hot shower followed by some hot sex. That always does the trick around here.”
Sienna is laughing so hard she can’t catch her breath. And shame on me, I should know by now that Garth doesn’t get embarrassed or back down so easily.
“Being that the second half of that plan isn’t an option, I’m going to say goodnight to you two freaks.”
“Love you, Sky.”
“Yeah, I love you guys too.”
I walk along, smiling and laughing to myself. Hot sex. I don’t think I’ve ever had sex that could be described as truly hot. I’ve given myself some spectacular orgasms, but Tyler? Hmm, I definitely enjoyed the journey to the finish line with him but he never got me all the way there.
He’d always finish first and pretty much collapse on top of me right after. I didn’t have it in me to ask for what I wanted. It was just easier to call it a day, to pretend when he’d ask if it was good for me.
Lying in bed wide awake, long after my roommate’s breathing evens out in a way that tells me she’s down for the count, I slip my hand under my shirt and mov
e up, cupping one breast and then the other.
I picture Tyler at first, but the image of him pressing his body against mine does nothing for me. Slipping my other hand beneath the waistband of my sleep shorts, I go with the image of a stranger. He’s broad-shouldered, muscular and powerful. His legs are strong and his ass is firm. He towers above me, making me feel like I’m at his mercy. His hands are rough but his touch is gentle, and his words are kind and reverent. He tells me that I’m his, that I’m all he needs.
At a certain point I’m aware that my stranger has taken the form of that man, Libby’s dad, otherwise known as Grumpy Daddy, but I ignore that inconvenient turn of events in my fantasy.
Grump or not, the man was hot, and right now he’s giving me the absolute best oral I’ve ever had. I’m close, so close, but I still can’t get there until I picture him bending me over the desk in my office and pounding me into oblivion.
I sound like I’ve run a marathon, and pull the blankets up over my head to muffle the sound as I come down from that blessed high.
Rolling over, now in a pleasantly hypnotic state, I giggle as I drift off to sleep. It may have been his face and his body, but the oh so lovely man in my fantasy was a big step up from that uptight jerk.
Chapter Twelve
Leo
“Maureen, you have to lighten up on the junk food, ok?”
An eye roll? Did she seriously just roll her eyes at me?
“Listen, I’m getting calls from school that her snack bag is filled with chips and sugary juice, and she’s refusing to eat the food harvested from the school’s garden.”
“Harvested?” She snorts. “If you ask me, I think that school is a crunchy granola ridiculous nightmare.”
“Nope…Didn’t ask.”
“So what am I supposed to be now, a babysitter or an organic farmer?”
“I’m just asking you to try to push the healthier stuff on Libby. I’m guilty of feeding her crap too, but I’m trying to make an effort.”