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To have his touch wipe away Oliver’s hands.
To feel safe.
Comforted.
Cherished.
Because in his arms, in Tank’s embrace, that was what it felt like.
I only wished that his actions backed up his feelings for me. Because he had asked me to wait,
With that thought in mind, I finished filling my plate, Lena and Oliver doing the same, and then I turned on my heel and headed to our table.
Feeling Tank's eyes on my back, burning into me, searing into my very soul.
I almost stopped and turned back.
Almost.
When we reached the table, we always claimed, I walked into my dad’s arms after he stood up at my approach and squeezed him tight, “Missed you.”
With his mouth near my ear, he said, “Missed you too, Cookie. You talk to him yet?”
And like my eyes had a mind of their own, they found him in the crowd immediately, and wouldn’t you know it, his eyes were directed at me as he stood in a group of five people.
Why did he have to look so good?
Did he wear that shirt to torture me?
Closing my eyes, I shook my head and then answered my dad’s unanswered question, “Not yet.”
He pulled back from me, looked into my eyes, and then voicing what’s been running through my mind, he said softly, but sternly, “You need to talk to him, Sweetheart. Find out why. I know how you feel about him. And I know how he feels about you. Listen to him. Yeah?”
I nodded, “I know what you’re saying, Dad. But he should have come to me. He should have trusted me to be there for him in whatever manner he needed.”
He sighed then, “Cookie, I can’t tell you what he told me. But what I will say is that, if I went through what he went through, I would hope that when I was ready to talk about it, the person I wanted to tell about it would take the time and listen to me.”
He was right. On so many levels.
And my father had just chided me for acting like a little shiitake mushroom.
Furthermore, he hammered home that I wasn’t acting like the adult I thought I was, not when he said, “But I think the boy deserves a break. I will say this. If you did to him what he did to you, he would have forgiven you. Because trust me, the way that boy looks at you, it's like you lit up the stars in his world.”
Only my dad would call Tank a boy.
I chuckled at that, “I hear you, Dad.”
“Okay Cookie.” And with that, he pressed a kiss atop my head, squeezed me once, and then let me go.
“Hey, I’m Oliver,” Oliver said to my dad.
I sighed. I was an idiot, and I was whooping Lena’s booty later.
My dad looked him up and down and then I knew what was going to come out of his mouth, I just knew it, and I was right, “Customary when you introduce yourself to someone you offer to shake their fucking hand.”
Oliver looked confused for a minute, and then he held out his hand, to which my dad grabbed it, and I choked on a laugh when I saw my dad’s forearm flexing and Oliver’s face turning red, “Storm.”
After he proved his point that he could break him with one hand, my dad let his go, then sat down, and started eating.
