Total pages in book: 71
Estimated words: 72196 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 361(@200wpm)___ 289(@250wpm)___ 241(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 72196 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 361(@200wpm)___ 289(@250wpm)___ 241(@300wpm)
I hadn’t called her ‘Sweet Girl’ in a long time, and likely she realized that.
If I was being honest, Alex hadn’t been ‘sweet’ for a while.
Her mother had ruined her. Treated her like she was some higher person in society and like her shit didn’t stink.
Allegra and I had split a while ago—years if we were counting the amount of time in which we’d been together but not ‘together,’ at least in the biblical sense.
Since we’d separated, and later divorced, Allegra had made it a point to mold my daughter into the little asshole she’d turned into. It sucked. I missed my little girl.
This staring, glaring, name calling kid wasn’t the one that I knew and loved.
Sure, I still loved Alex, no matter what. But this kid wasn’t the one that had begged me to take her fishing. Wasn’t the one that had pleaded with me to ride in my ‘toe tuck.’
She was Allegra’s child. She was everything that I hated in Allegra.
“Thank you!” Hannah’s girl smiled, her flashy white teeth revealing one single tooth missing.
Which reminded me.
“Oh, hey, baby,” I turned to Alex. “Did the Tooth Fairy bring you some money for your lost tooth?”
I’d gotten a text from Allegra that Alex had lost her first tooth about a week ago. Yes, you heard that right. A week ago.
“The Tooth Fairy isn’t real, Dad.” Alex’s snide comment had me clenching my fists. “You know how Mommy doesn’t like to lie to me.”
Unlike you was left unsaid.
Excuse the fuck out of me if I wanted my kid to believe in the unreal for just a little bit longer. Excuse-fucking-me!
“What?” Hannah’s little girl asked in dejected surprise. “Mama?”
I winced, forgetting for a moment that we weren’t alone.
I looked over to Hannah apologetically.
“I’m sorry,” I told her. “We’re just gonna go sit over there.”
I got up and gave Alex a glare that clearly meant ‘move your ass or I’ll beat it.’
She moved.
I sat down on the next stupid white chair and turned my angry eyes to Alex.
“You know,” I told her, “that was a jerk move.”
Alex batted her eyelashes. “I don’t like her.”
I gritted my teeth.
“Who?”
“Either.”
“Why?” I questioned. “What did they ever do to you?”
Alex crossed her arms over her chest, and the move let her shirt that was already too low for my taste to begin with fall down even lower.
I held my tongue. Barely.
“Why are you even here?” she countered, refusing to answer my question.
“I’m here because I know that this meant so much to you,” I told her honestly. “And I know that you said something about wanting to go.”
She looked down at her lap, a trace of discomfort gracing her face before it fled altogether.
I could see the moment that she decided to be ugly instead of apologizing.
“Well, I don’t want you here.”
Two hours later, I was thankful that I had the choice of whether to take Alex home or not.
Thankfully, her mother would be here to pick her up from the Mommy and Me class, because I was so ready to go it wasn’t even funny.
My daughter was acting like a royal asshole, and I didn’t want to be around her any longer.
Sure, after I calmed down, I would be back to loving my kid no matter what, but right now, with her anger and rude words that she’d tossed at me over the last two hours, I was ready for it to be over.
I looked down and away from Allegra’s car, knowing from experience if I let her see me and stopped, I would be forced to talk to her.
I thought I’d gotten away with it, too. But then I heard my name.
I hesitated, but it was enough for Allegra to notice me. Then call out to me.
“You’re being paged,” Hannah whispered.
I felt Hannah’s hand on my bicep, and turned, pausing in my death march.
“I hear,” I muttered darkly. “I’m heading over now.”
She patted my arm and started to go, but I stopped her by reaching for her retreating hand.
“I’m sorry again for what Alex said,” I told her. “She’s been so rude lately, to everyone including me. But I never in a million years would’ve thought she’d reveal something like that.”
She smiled and reached up to pull a white string off the side of my shirt before replying.
“It’ll be okay. Reggie’s a tough girl. Reggie and I come from tough stock.”
I sighed. “Just wish you didn’t have to. She disappointed me today, and I’ll have a talk with her mother to be sure that that doesn’t happen again.”
“I know you heard me, asshole!”
I gritted my teeth and turned.
Only I made a mistake. I allowed Hannah to witness Allegra’s venom.
And in doing so, I familiarized the two women with one another, even if they weren’t formally ‘introduced.’
“I heard you, Allegra,” I told her bluntly, making my words steely and hard. “But I’m apologizing to another parent for your daughter’s rudeness. Please, give me a moment.”