Chapter 37
IT’S A CHAOTIC BUT WONDERFUL LIFE
Heath
Lav takes the news that Cricket and I are officially dating well.
As well as she can, anyway.
“Will you still slay dragons with me, or are you just going to make moon eyes at my dad all the time?” she asks Cricket over dinner, which we’re eating together at the high counter in the kitchen. Grilled cheese, at Lav’s request, with a side of applesauce and ice cream sandwiches for dessert.
She could’ve asked for an early birthday cake every night from now until her party in eight days, and I would’ve given it to her.
Anything to make this easier.
“Who told you about moon eyes?” Cricket asks her instead of answering the question.
“Aunt Pip. She said Dori makes moon eyes at the mailman.”
“He’s a lot cuter than your dad,” Cricket replies. “I think we’re safe.”
Lav nods once. “That’s a really good point. I’m glad being in love won’t turn you stupid.”
“Same. I’ve been there before. Not doing it again.”
“Are you going to stay in my dad’s bedroom and make funny dog noises?”
I choke on my grilled cheese.
“Unlikely,” Cricket says. “That would keep all of us from sleeping, and sleep’s important.”
“But you could stay in my dad’s room and not make funny dog noises?”
“That’s perhaps a possibility.”
“My friend Leland says that his mom has three boyfriends, but only one makes funny dog noises in her bedroom. She used to have four, but one died.”
Cricket’s mouth opens, then closes, and she looks at me.
I look at Lav. “Leland? Leland, whose mom is Jennifer?”
“Yeah.”
“He told you that?”
“Yeah.” She munches on her sandwich and stares at me. “Then he had to go talk to the principal.”
“Was he close with his mom’s boyfriend who died?” Cricket asks.
“No, he was on the beach.”
It takes a hot second, but I start to catch on. “He died on the beach?”
“Daddy, keep up. Leland’s still alive.”
“Leland’s mom’s boyfriend. Did Leland’s mom’s boyfriend die on the beach?”
“No, he died in the ocean. He got ate by a shark. Leland was on the beach.”
Cricket and I look at each other.
I’m itching to hit the internet to see if someone actually died by shark bite recently. Don’t think so, but I haven’t been watching the news closely.
“I did a lifestyle segment once on people who save marine animals that wash ashore,” Cricket announces.
“How do they wash the shore?” Lav asks. “It’s really dirty. That’s a hard job. And why would they? The shore is supposed to be dirty. It’s nature.”
Sometimes Pip and my daughter are one person.
“Wash ashore,” Cricket says. “It means they’re supposed to be in the ocean but the water carries them onto the beach.”
Lav grins like she knew that.
I catch her eye. “Lav, would it upset you if Cricket stayed in my room?”
She furrows her brow. “Would The Cockinator stay in your room too?”
“The Cluckinator and her sisters have their own home now.”
“Can I stay in your room so we can have a sleepover?”
“Sleepovers are more fun with a TV,” Cricket says before I can formulate an answer.
But this—this, I can go with. I nod gravely. “They are. And we don’t have TVs in our bedrooms.”
Cricket wrinkles her nose. “So I guess we could have sleepovers, but they’ll have to be in the living room.”
Lav looks between us. “Are you trying to trick me?”
“Did you watch TV when you’ve had sleepovers at the main house?” Cricket asks her.
Lav’s eyes narrow. “Yes. Ginny has a TV in her room. So we could put a TV in our bedrooms.”
I shake my head. “No TVs in bedrooms.”
“But Ginny does it.”
“The fun thing about being an adult is that the only rules are to drive the speed limit, don’t steal, don’t murder, and pay your taxes,” Cricket says.
“After that, you get to make your own rules. Ginny’s rules can be different from your dad’s rules.
And when you’re a grown-up, you get to make your own rules too. ”
“Being a grown-up is hard. I don’t want to do it.”
“I like being a grown-up,” Cricket tells her.
“But you don’t act like a grown-up.”
“That’s because I have a rule against it.”
Lav’s lips part, and then she takes another bite of her sandwich while she squints across the kitchen like she’s pondering grown-ups having rules against being grown-ups.
After two bites, she looks back at Cricket. “If you’re my dad’s girlfriend, does that mean you can help read me bedtime stories?”
“I can help read you bedtime stories whether or not I’m your dad’s girlfriend.”
Lav shakes her head. “I just don’t understand why you’d subject yourself to being a girlfriend. Boys are gross. No offense, Dad.”
Why you’d subject yourself?
Is she almost seven or almost seventeen?
“None taken,” I tell her.
“You’re not going to ask me to help write poems for Cricket, are you?” she asks.
“I will handle all poetry duty myself.”
“I don’t want to read them either.”
“I will not ask you to read them.”
“He’s really bad at poetry,” Lav says to Cricket. “He thought home rhymed with ghost.”
“Poetry has as few rules as being an adult does,” Cricket says. “Sometimes close is good enough. Does your dad write a lot of poetry?”
“No, he mostly cusses when I tell him I need help with it.”
“What kind of cussing?”
“The normal kind. With the d-word.”
Cricket grins at me. “Not the d-word.”
“Yeah.” Lav nods. “He says dang it when I have to make poems.”
“Do you ever write poems about dragons?”
Lav’s eyes go round like it hasn’t occurred to her. “Hold my dessert. I have to go write a poem.”
She slides off her stool and runs down the hall toward her room, scaring the cat, who yowls and darts into the living room.
The good news?
Fluffy’s a little less fluffy this week.
The bad news?
She’s almost less-fluffy enough to jump up onto the kitchen stools again, where she can get into food Lav leaves on the counters, which will make her fluffy again.
This yo-yo dieting can’t be good for her.
“Did that go well?” Cricket asks me.
I snort in amusement and shake my head. “Yes. It did.”
“Is all that stuff about Leland real?”
“Probably most of it.”
“Should we send his mom a gift basket? Death is hard.”
“And this is why I love you.” I lean across Lav’s empty seat to hook my hand behind Cricket’s neck and kiss her.
She’s smiling with wet eyes when I pull back. “You make me so happy.”
“You’ve been making yourself happy. I’m the ice cream on the side.”
“Do I make you happy?”
I suck in a deep breath and glance around the kitchen.
It’s always looked like this. Dean’s last caretaker redid it shortly before Dean kicked the bucket, which likely also didn’t help the financial situation around here.
But it looks new.
Fresh.
Home in ways it never has before.
Like the missing piece has finally clicked into place.
“You make me feel like a me I haven’t been in a lot of years,” I tell Cricket. “Didn’t even realize I was missing that guy.”
She smiles wider. “He was worth finding again.”
“He was.”
Lav barrels back into the room with paper and crayons. “What rhymes with slayer?” she asks as she climbs onto her seat and shoves her dinner out of the way.
I open my mouth.
Cricket opens her mouth.
“Player?” she finally says as I say, “Surveyor.”
“You two are so not meant for each other,” Lav declares.
Then she sticks her tongue out of one side of her mouth and bends over the paper, concentrating as she begins writing words in yellow-green crayon.
I look at Cricket.
Her eyes dance as they meet mine.
Not worried.
Not freaking out because my daughter declared us a mismatch.
Simply amused.
And affectionate.
And rolling with it.
My heart evens out. I hadn’t even realized how nervous I was.
If Lav had objected, then that would’ve been the end of it.
Not that I expected her to.
She loves Cricket all on her own.
Because it’s so easy to love Cricket. Just as she is.
As she’s always been.