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Absentmindedly, I traced my fingertip delicately over the snap, my head already wondering if it could be expertly processed into a larger frame for Layla to keep.
“May I?” Harper interjected as she pointed to the rest of the pile of prints. I nodded and she scooped them together in one hand. Flipping through them she made no comment until she came to the final one and I heard her gasp.
Faltering, she slowly lowered the photographs back onto the bed and stood. “I’m sorry for the intrusion, I’ve overstepped… I just thought… I’ll leave you to it. I’d better get back and check on Layla, she should be waking from her nap soon,” she babbled hurriedly as she made for the door. Sensing her discomfort, my eyes narrowed as she opened it.
“Harper?” I probed in a questioning tone.
With her hand on the doorknob, she stopped opening the door but stayed facing away from me.
“Yeah?”
“Thanks. Your ‘intrusion’ as you call it was most welcome. It gave me the strength I need right now to help me move forward with this. I’d been dreading opening this box… you made it a damned sight easier for me to…” To what? Put these memories to rest? I didn’t know how to finish what I’d started to say.
“Glad I could be here for you. Thank you for letting me in,” she replied, before opening the door fully and closing it softly behind her.
Inhaling deeply, I exhaled and returned my focus to the mementos on the bed. Picking the pictures up, I flicked slowly through them until I came to the last one.
The second I saw it, my heart splintered and my mind traveled faster than the speed of light to the moment in the picture. In my hand, captured for posterity, was the last kiss in life I ever gave to my beautiful dying wife.
The memory of that day had sat heavily on my chest like some cruel medieval torture implement, unrelenting and designed to inflict the maximum pain, which it had.
If the picture was meant to comfort me, it didn’t. If it was designed to commemorate the awful experience, it did that for the sake of others, because in my mind it was a daily vivid event and I had no use for such an image.
Going back to the palm print image, I placed my hand on top of the two already there and I groaned, heaved a heavy sigh, then returned the items to the box. After placing it neatly back in its place in the closet, I closed the door. I had an overwhelming emotional need to be close to my daughter.
Pushing open the door of the nursery, Harper’s eyes caught mine and I saw she’d been crying. After seeing the picture of myself with Grace at the end of her life, I couldn’t blame her.
“Want to take an hour out? It’s been a heavy day. I’d like a little alone time with my daughter.”
Harper gave me a knowing smile, one that hinted Layla was exactly what I needed to escape my feelings of despair.
“Absolutely. I could do with a change of sweater. Your gorgeous, but highly productive, daughter slobbered down my back when she ate too much cake.”
A chuckle escaped my lips as I shook my head. “That’s my little rocker girl, living life to excess,” I replied, and my grin grew bigger.
If you need me, you know where I am,” she offered and scooted out the door before I could argue with her.
“So…” I began as I sat down, placing Layla on my knee. She was facing me, her bright gray eyes in an innocent stare. Gazing up at me, she lay quietly, as if I held the answers to the universe in my grasp.
“What are we gonna do with you, Baby?” I asked sadly, while I thought of something else to say.
Layla lurched forward and grabbed my beard. “It isn’t spiky, right? It’s soft and loveable. Your mom loved my beard,” I added, suddenly realizing I’d shared something about Grace with Layla without a second thought.
Grabbing a fistful, my daughter held it tight and pulled my face forward. The child’s grip was a force I never knew such a little person could possess. “Ouch,” I muttered, one hand leaving her body to circle her fist, thus preventing her from ripping a chunk of my beard clean off my face.
“Ow,” I scowled again and Layla immediately let out a gummy, wide-mouthed laugh.
“Seriously, Baby? You almost disfigured me and it’s funny?”
The sterner I spoke, the more infectious her laughter became until she had me laughing aloud too.
“I can see I’m going to have to up my game in the scolding department,” I told her through another chuckle.
Once her laughing wound down, Layla yawned and I cradled her in my arms. When I stared down at my sleepy looking infant, I felt my heart clench and I admitted she had fast become my world. A sobering thought washed over me. At some point I was going to have to go back to work and leave her and this thought hurt me more than I ever knew it would.
I had no concerns over the day-to-day childcare for my daughter. My mom was a hard woman to please and she’d chosen well, because Harper was sweet-natured, coolheaded, and more than capable of taking care of Layla.
Matty, our housekeeper, was like a second mom and had been with me since the week after Grace and I had moved in. I knew she’d be an awesome backup for Harper if she ever needed anything.
