Not only is dance cool, but finally really seeing Noelle do it, especially after these two hard years…it really meant something to me. Made me want to see her hold on to it. Made me want to give it a shot myself just for the hell of it. No way could I forget it like she told me to.
Will I be half as good as she is? Nope.
Will I embarrass myself? Probably.
But it’ll make her smile and it’ll be entertaining, same as the other night when I took ballet arm lessons from Miss Theodora. Plus, it just might give Noelle the confidence to pick back up on dancing if she wants to, no matter how casually.
So much cold pain comes from the parts of life we can’t control. Why waste precious time resisting what makes us happy?
—
I get in a good evening of working on easy ballet steps and generally chilling before Noelle calls. She and Theo had a nice time with Ceceli, and now the kiddo is asleep.
When asked what I’ve been up to, I give a vague answer about relaxing, then focus on recounting my busy workday. She agrees that Derek is a fool and that Chartreuse is funny. Then she tells me about her own day, and I groan at the story of how their mini fridge of free water bottles sprung a leak without anyone noticing…until she slipped on the puddle on the floor. And dropped an entire tray of two kinds of popular chocolates. And busted her ass, which she hopes won’t be bruised.
“That sucks,” I say sympathetically. “But your tailbone is all right, huh?”
“It is,” she sighs, sounding thankful. “God, do you remember that time—”
“—when Cliff bruised his tailbone at the bowling alley?”
“Yes!” she whisper-shouts, not wanting to wake Theo. “When he tripped ‘cause he was walking backward and talking crap at the same time!”
I groan again, remembering watching him fall directly onto his ass. I knew then and there that he had hurt himself. His outburst of colorful language confirmed it (and also got us complained against by the family playing at a nearby lane).
Of all the injuries I’ve had in my life, I’ve been lucky not to suffer any tailbone trauma. The very thought makes me cringe. How do you not agitate an injury like that?
Well, according to Cliff’s woeful experience, you don’t not agitate it.
Noelle and I start talking about whether Theo is too young to bowl, but momentarily, we’re interrupted by the child herself. She’s crying something fierce, Noelle tells me worriedly—and unnecessarily, because I can hear it for myself.
And after waiting on the line while the situation gets checked out, I learn Theo has just woken up from a bad dream.
About Cliff.
About Cliff being gone.
She dreamt they were playing together, having fun, smiling…and then he disappeared and never came back. She waited for him and called for him, but he never came back.
I can hear her stomach-deep cries.
Just like that, my good mood is being shredded to pieces, and so am I.
She sobs, “I wanna see my daddy,” near the phone, because Noelle is holding her, I think.
And I feel like bursting out of my skin with anger at how unfair it is that she can’t see him. That she has to hurt this way. That Noelle can’t fix it for her—that I can’t fix the way Noelle has suddenly gone tearful along with her daughter.
But I could try to fix some part of this if I weren’t so far from them. Some little part.
“Do you need me to come over?” I ask beneath Theo’s juddering crying. “If you need me, I’ll come right now.”
I think I hear a breath of a sob leave Noelle before she sniffles and asks Theo if she wants to see me.
The kid’s answer is too whimpered for me to understand.
Noelle translates, though, her own voice weakening: “She wants Uncle Beck and her daddy.”
My lungs burn from how hard I exhale.
Looks like I was holding my breath.
There were times when Theodora was heartbroken like this and didn’t want to see me. Not at all. She wanted Cliff, not me. And I understood—to my core, I did—but I’d be lying if I said it didn’t sting. Not only did I want to help comfort her, but in a way, it also would’ve comforted me to be there. I, too, missed Cliff and wanted to see him, and I hoped for fellowship with the other souls who shared in my grief.
But I’ve been welcome more often than not by this point, and hearing that I’m welcome now has me out the door in a rush of donned shoes and grabbed keys.
I still heed Noelle’s solemn order to drive carefully, though. Of course I do; I always do.
When I get to their house, she greets me in the dimly lit front hall with heaviness in her damp eyes and a tearstained Theo in her arms. Although they aren’t currently crying, I can tell they were just before I arrived.
My hands fly out to rub soothingly at their backs—but both of them take it a step further than that. Theo puts her arms out to me, wanting me to hold her, and Noelle steps right up to me, looking like my presence is a shelter she has to hide away in before she falls apart.
I don’t hesitate to accept them.
I’ve soon got the small girl settled on one of my arms, secured against my side, and her mama curled up in the other, fixed against my chest.
Theo crumples into fresh tears now.
Shortly, so does Noelle.
I have the aching feeling my own composure is about to crack, because this hurts me all over again. Worse, in a way, now that it’s right in my face.
But at least we aren’t apart anymore.
“I m-miss my daddy, Uncle B-Beck,” Theo cries against my shoulder.
Our little spot in the world is definitely taking on a watery blur.
Throatily, I murmur, “Yeah, sweetheart, I know. I miss him too.”
Noelle quakes under my arm, weeps quietly into my shirt.
I tighten my hold on them for a second, then start shuffling us away from the front door. “Come on. Let’s go sit down.”
Theo wraps her arms around my neck. Noelle slips away to lock the door, and then she’s back with us, tucking herself into my side as we walk.
We’ll be all right, I tell myself, even though it’s still hard to believe in times like this. Because that’s what has always gotten us through: believing and moving forward. It has worked for us over the last two years, and it worked for me and Cliff for many years before then.
We’ll be all right—somehow, sooner or later—as long as we keep believing and moving.
Especially if we’re doing it together.
—
I’m startled awake by something smacking me hard in the face.
Pulse racing, I scramble to determine what has attacked me, preparing to defend myself against it—
—and as soon as my bleary eyes start working properly in the sunlight, I get my answer.
Theo is asleep next to me on the living room floor, and she’s sprawled out like a snow angel. One of her arms has just been flung across my face.
My tense muscles relax. So does my heart rate.
“Ow, The-o-dor-a,” I say scratchily.
“Oh no,” hits the air from the other side of her. Noelle’s soft voice is also scratchy. “She hit you, too, Beck?”
Before I can turn my head that way, there’s a comforting palm on my forehead—and a pokey fingertip in my eye, startling me again.
We both gasp as she yanks her hand back.
“No, no, no! Oh, Beckett! I’m so sorry—I was trying to pat your head! I was trying to be sweet ‘cause Theo hurt you.” She groans. “But then I hurt you.”
Even the throbbing in my eye can’t stop me from laughing.
I finally get out from under the kid’s arm and look over at Noelle, at the embarrassment and concern etched on her face.
That expression aside, she gives in to amusement as easily as I did.
“Are you okay?” she asks on a chortle.
I nod. “I’m fine.”
“Really?”
“Mmhmm.” I
reach over and pat at her head, particularly her sleep-mussed hair. “Thanks for trying to comfort me after my terrifying encounter with Crazy Sleeper Theodora.”
She grins. “Oh, yeah. I’ve had many of them. I know how you feel.” Carefully, she moves Theo’s arm from across her neck. “Look at this—she tried to elbow me in the throat.”
We share another laugh. Then it fades, and we’re left just looking at each other. I settle my arm safely above her head, on her pillow, and note that her eyes are still a little puffy from last night.
Remembering all that makes me sigh.
Makes me hurt.
She, Theo, and I spent at least an hour bundled up on the couch, grieving Cliff together once again.
We’ve had longer nights—and worse ones—but it was still bleak. It still tired us out. We ended up making this blanket bed on the floor and falling asleep situated like we currently are, with Theo between me and Noelle.
As far as I know, we all slept soundly. And I feel much more stable now, as Noelle seems to, despite the slight frown that’s showing up to mar her pretty face.
It reminds me of the end of our night, when we were lying here in the darkness with Theo finally back to sleep. She told me in a heavy-hearted hush that she was sorry my relaxing night at home turned out like it did; she was so grateful I came over, but she hated inconveniencing me.
I reached over and fumbled my way into stroking at her hair, much like I did a minute ago, and refused her apology.
“You know nothing matters more to me than this,” I’d whispered, “don’t you?”
She didn’t say anything, just tentatively reached up and curved a hand around my forearm.
So I said it again, still quietly, more firmly despite my throatiness: “Nothing matters more to me than you.”
That time, I felt her nod. And even without seeing her eyes, I could sense how fiercely she believed me.
Presently, those blue eyes hold a trace of that belief, like part of her wants to thank me or apologize again, but the rest of her has finally comprehended that she doesn’t have to.
A simple, “We love you, Super Beck,” is all she goes with.
It warms me all the way through.
“I love you guys,” I murmur.
The sweet way she smiles warms me even more.
Then Theo is suddenly stirring. She flops around and sits up, somehow not hitting us anew in the process. Her hair is even wilder than her mama’s.
For a wordless, motionless few seconds, the three of us glance between one another; we’re all waiting for the smallest and most fragile of us to decide how she feels after last night.
And the verdict is….
“Uncle Beck, my tummy wants pancakes.”
Nice.
Noelle gives a light laugh of relief, and I grin in kind. Seeing that child with a broken heart is one of the worst things I’ve ever experienced, and I know the same is true for Noelle. We’re glad she isn’t tearing up all over again.
“Well, guess what your tummy is gonna get,” I reply.
Theo’s eyes brighten. “Pancakes!”
“Yep, pancakes!” As I start sitting up, too, I throw an amused look at Noelle. “You know what that means.”
With brightened eyes of her own, she agrees, “I do.” Then she pats Theo’s knee. “Come on. We’ve got some hair-fixing to do!”
So our day begins with a mood as easy as last night’s was difficult.
After breakfast (during which the girls got syrup on their shirts instead of in their hair), Noelle decides to gently check that Theo really is doing better about Cliff. She asks if any more sad dreams came around, asks if she wants to talk about anything. But although Theo’s expression dims at the mention of him, that’s the worst of it.
In fact, she says calmly, “I’m okay. But I still miss Daddy. But you and Uncle Beck made me feel better, so I’m not really, really sad anymore. Just a little sad. But I’m also happy ‘cause of my pancakes.”
Once again, it’s a response we’re glad for.
Balancing out sadness with some kind of happiness is the way to go, if it can be managed. Took me a long time to realize it usually can, but I did realize it. With the help of my best friend and his girls, I learned there’s always something to be grateful for, something to appreciate, something to look forward to.
It has been hard lately, but Noelle and Theo and I are getting better at finding those things.
I don’t know if it’s accurate to say that’s a relief, but it’s something like a relief. It shows we aren’t hopelessly broken.
What I do know is that what Cliff and I used to say is true: slow progress is better than none.
Now that breakfast is over, it’s a bit after ten. Noelle has to be at work at noon, so I decide I’ll head home for a little while. She and Theo need to get ready for the day, and so do I.
And it’s strange: although I know very well by now that the days can twist and turn and lift and fall without warning, like what Noelle said about my night last night…well, more and more all the time, I feel prepared for whatever kind of day lies ahead. Our morning has been good so far, and maybe that’ll change, but maybe it won’t. In any case, we’re going to find some way to be okay.
So while being walked to their front door reminds me of how distraught we all were in this very spot last night, all I can really feel is a sense of steadiness. I’m ready to see how we’ll face life today.
The calmness with which Noelle watches me step into the sunlight makes me think she feels like that too.
It feels good.
—
“You want chicken nuggets?” I ask Theo with playful disbelief. “But you ate pancakes just a little while ago!”
“Nuh uh!” She jumps up and down where she’s standing in front of me, and her golden-blonde ponytail bounces with her. “That wasn’t a little while ago. It was forever ago!”
“Oh, okay,” I laugh out. Then I point at the chocolates sitting with us at our two-seater table. “Well, what about all this snacking you’ve been doing?”
She sighs and gives me a raised-eyebrows look.
“Uncle Beck, that’s not real food,” she says like she’s grown and not going on five years old. “That is candy.”
I laugh my ass off at that one.
In truth, it’s been about two and a half hours since breakfast, and Theo really does eat pretty frequently. I guess it’s a kid thing; they’re growing and all that. Hell, I can’t act like I’ve never been a food vacuum myself.
However, her grandma will be here in about thirty minutes to pick her up and distract her with more fun until Noelle gets off work at six. There are undoubtedly food plans scattered throughout those hours because Gail Bright is the quintessential adoring grandmother.
So I tell Theo, “You make strong points, kiddo, but Grammie will be here pretty soon, and I bet she’ll wanna get some chicken nuggets with you.”
“Oh, yeah!” Now Theo jumps up and down with excitement. She loves her grandma.
I’m glad she’s got such a great one on Noelle’s side—such a great grandpa, too, at that. Cliff’s parents were cold and critical and controlling. When they learned he and Noelle were expecting, they were adamant that either he should leave her or they should terminate the pregnancy because he wasn’t ‘good enough’ to be a dad. That was the last straw for him. Coincidentally, his refusal of their attitude was the last straw for them; they said he was out of their life and to never come asking for help when he inevitably failed.
It wasn’t the punishment they believed it was. After that, they had nothing to do with Cliff or his new family, and I had never seen my friend happier than he was in those years. Mr. and Mrs. Cavill’s inflexibility had always been unreasonable. Their absence was for the best.
Disgustingly, even the death of their son didn’t change their hearts. I found them walking up to the funeral home just before the visitation began, and their only interest was in his will. When I told them they weren’t i
n it, they got belligerent. But of course, upon being escorted off the property, their self-righteousness fell back into place; they insisted they didn’t care about Cliff excluding them and that they didn’t need to be kicked off the grounds because they were done there of their own volition.
Noelle and Theodora hadn’t been outside with me at that time, and I’m glad for it, though I did eventually tell Noelle what happened. I don’t know what I would’ve done if Cliff’s parents had dared to be as shitty to his girls as they were to him.
But now is not the time to go on thinking about such things. The kid has climbed back up into her chair and returned her attention to the chocolate-dipped pretzel rod she’s been savoring.
“I guess a pretzel isn’t candy,” she concedes as she holds it up in her little hand. “It’s just a pretzel.”
“Ah,” I say, “you’re right about that.”
“But the chocolate on it is candy. So it’s only kind of candy.” She gasps and looks at me with hope. “Will Mommy let me eat more of them if they’re only kind of candy?”
“Probably not,” I say on a snicker.
Her expression dips. “Oh.” She extends the pretzel rod to me, the chocolate on which is riddled with teeth marks. “Want a bite?”
My snickering becomes fresh full laughter. “Thank you, but nope.”
She goes quiet, just gazing around and eating her snack, before asking to watch something on my phone. I set her up with a princess movie she likes on Netflix, then kick back in my chair and look around The Chocolate Shop myself.
It being Saturday, the place has been decently busy since the three of us arrived. Then there’s the matter of how the other employee scheduled for this shift is late because he’s having car trouble. With Ceceli working in the back, Noelle has been taking care of customers alone and thus hasn’t had free time to chat with us. But she has found little moments to look, smile, and wave at us.
I catch her eye now as she glances up from replenishing receipt paper at the register. The grin she shoots me is charming, like her floppy hair bun and the pale yellow of her sweater and the string of fake pearls looped around her neck. I’m not sure what she chortles at, but chortle she does, and it makes me smile.
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