Chapter 3
Dakota
“Daddy?”
I looked up from my phone, which I’d been casually scrolling while Caroline played with her dollhouse on the living room floor. “Yes, baby?”
“Can we have a fancy Christmas, too?”
I frowned and put my phone down. “What do you mean?”
She put her dolls down. “You know. Like Mr. Colin has.”
When it hit me, I chuckled. “I don’t know. That’s a lot of work.”
“But they’re so pretty.” She jumped up from her spot on the floor and spun around before facing me again. “They sparkle. It’s like a castle.”
With a sigh, I tucked my phone into my pocket, knowing I was about to cave in. I was never good at telling her no, especially when it was something innocuous like Christmas decor. “Maybe we can. Did you know there’s a prize for the best-looking house in Port Grandlin?”
Her eyes went wide. “There is?”
I hummed and nodded. “Mmm-hmm. One thousand dollars.”
“Wow,” she breathed.
I scooped her in my arms and tickled her. As she giggled and squirmed, I continued. “Think of how many dolls you could buy with a thousand dollars.”
“A million!”
After another second of tickling, I set her next to me on the couch. “What should the decorations look like?”
She shrugged. “Sparkly.”
I gave her a solemn nod. “Of course. What else?”
“Could we have a winter princess? A big one, like as big as you. And she’s sprinkling magic dust everywhere and the dust is the lights!”
“That sounds like a tall order,” I said. “Maybe we keep it a little more tame for our first year, hmm?”
Her small shoulders slumped a bit. “Okay,” she said, sounding just a bit disappointed.
“Fine.” I sighed. “We’ll find a way to make it work. A winter princess with princess dust. But only if you help.” My mental wheels were turning already, trying to figure out how I’d manage to make a princess out of Christmas lights.
“Yes!” She pumped her fist in the air.
“Okay, then. Go get your shoes on. We have a lot of shopping to do.” While she got ready, I texted Robbie and asked him to meet us at the hardware store. To pull this off, I’d need backup.
An hour later, the three of us were at the home improvement store, browsing the aisles. I had a cart full of strands of lights in all different sizes and colors, along with hooks to hang them on the house.
“How are we going to make a life-sized princess?” I asked Robbie as we wandered through the store.
He closed his eyes briefly. “What if you used chicken wire?”
I couldn’t help but laugh. “To make a princess?”
“Sure,” he said with a shrug. “For the body shape, anyway. Wooden dowel rods wrapped with layers of chicken wire, then lights, then covered in some sort of fabric. It might not be the most elegant daytime solution, but I bet it would be pretty at night, which is the point, right?”
“Sure, whatever you say.” I followed him to the back of the store, where we grabbed a big roll of the flexible mesh wire, dowels, plywood, and assorted other equipment he thought we might need to build a princess.
“And for the dress, we’ll probably have to hit the fabric store,” he said, pulling a box of staples for the staple gun off the shelf and putting it into the cart.
I groaned softly and rubbed a hand over my face. This was getting much more complicated than I’d hoped and we’d just started. “What about a tree skirt?”
Robbie paused for a moment, looking up as he thought. “I don’t think that’ll work. They’re not usually thin enough to show much light through them, are they? And you want the lights to be visible.”
“Good point. Can’t hurt to check, though, right?”
“Lead the way,” he said.
We headed back to the holiday decoration section, and as we roamed, I let Lina pick out a wreath for the door. We spotted a section of tree skirts that were pretty, but like Robbie had said, they wouldn’t work. The fabric wasn’t thin enough.
“Daddy, look!”
I turned to where Lina was pointing and groaned inwardly. “Inflatables?”
She nodded vigorously and ran in the direction of the inflatables, Robbie and I following after her at a more reasonable pace.
She was jumping up and down by the time we reached her, standing in front of a vast inflatable scene.
There were reindeer, several Santas, a variety of different colored inflatable Christmas trees, popular cartoon characters, and, to my surprise, a giant white unicorn with a rainbow mane and tail, with a wreath around its inflatable neck.
“Please, Daddy? Can we?”
I looked at Robbie for help, but he held his hands up in mock self-defense. “Don’t look at me,” he said. “You don’t want to hear my answer.”
I laughed softly and rubbed the back of my neck. “Which is?”
He grinned and I knew my goose was cooked, so to speak. “All princesses need a unicorn as a friend.”
“Daddy, it’s a white unicorn pony!” Lina was practically shouting, still jumping up and down. “Please? Can we? Please?”
I sighed. “Of course we can. You’re right. What princess scene doesn’t need a white unicorn pony?”
She cheered in excitement as Robbie slid the box from the shelf and hefted it into our cart. “This thing is heavier than you’d think,” he murmured.
“It’s the least you can do,” I muttered dryly.
After that, I led the way to the checkout line, deflecting any other requests—except the one where Lina asked for a necklace with Christmas lights that actually lit up, because as I’d proven again and again that day, I had a hard time saying no.
“No more, though,” I said firmly.
She nodded and let out a sleepy sigh, telling me that even though she was a grown-up kindergartener, she still needed a nap from time to time. “Thank you, Daddy.”
I ruffled her blonde hair gently. “You’re welcome.”
A few minutes—and a few hundred dollars—later, we were in the parking lot, working creatively to load everything into the back of my minivan as Caroline put herself into her car seat.
Once it was all in, Robbie took the shopping cart back to the corral and headed to his car, saying he’d promised his mom he’d help her with something and wishing us luck.
I looked over my purchases one last time, sighing softly as I realized just how much I was in over my head, before I closed the trunk and took Lina and myself back home.