My chest pinches. “We don’t hate each other. She’s just easy to irritate.”
“Dad,” she groans.
I’m about to say goodbye when she adds, “She offered to help me with the cheer tryout.”
Dr. Greely calls this conversation-sandbagging. Apparently the teenaged brain needs an entire day to work up to dropping big, complex topics on their unsuspecting parental units. The timing sucks. By this time of the day, my batteries are drained.
But I can rally. “What happened to ‘hard pass’?”
“It might be fun.”
The edge in her tone could mean she’s afraid of my reaction, or she’s not actually sure how she feels about this idea and is testing it out. “You know I’ll support you either way.”
“I know,” she says quickly. It almost sounds defensive. Meaning she’s afraid I’ll judge her. Something I’ve never done and never will do to my daughter. “Did you know Meg’s mom was a cheer coach?” Greta adds.
The framed picture of pigtailed Meg standing between her mom’s legs on the ice rink flashes into my mind. “I did not.”
“Even if I make the team, I can still turn it down.”
“True.” I choose my words for the next bit carefully. “Have you ever done something like that before?” I lob the neutral question hoping it will entice her immature frontal lobe to wake up and get to work.
“Well, no.” There’s a long silence where I wait for her to try to picture how she’ll confront the cheer coach with news of quitting before she’s had a chance to start. “I guess that would kind of suck.”
This is likely as much as I can hope for via phone, but I’ll be finding a way to work it into conversation when I see her next.
We say goodbye and I head for my room.
Once I’m in bed, the idea of Meg helping my daughter achieve a goal—if that’s what she decides—stirs something raw inside my chest. It’s not a bad feeling. It’s just…new. I know Greta and Meg talk sometimes and not just about cat sitting, so it’s not out of left field that Greta would seek her out for help. I just never imagined seeing Greta with a female role model that’s not Kelly or one of her coaches. Certainly not the person I’m fantasizing about deep-throating my cock.
It's a reminder that every decision I make with Meg, I have to consider Greta’s feelings. The divorce was devastating for her too. I was adamant about never sharing the reasons behind it—no twelve-year old needs to know such details about her parents—and for a long time, Greta buried her frustration. She was hurting, and it tore me up. It’sexactlyhow I was at her age. Until I snapped, and the fighting started.
Thanks to help from Dr. Greely, and Greta connecting with gymnastics, plus lots of steady reassurance mixed with my efforts to grow her self-confidence, Greta seems to have pulled through. But I’m never putting myself or my daughter through that kind of anguish again.
The tones wake me just after 3:00 am. Structure fire. All units.
I autopilot into my uniform and file into the hallway, where the others are moving toward the pole holes. Once I’m down in the truck bay, I suit up. Will Hayes comes next to me, his expression flashing between eagerness and flat-out panic.
Engines rumble to life and my crew climbs into the engine. Our three units pull out, sirens wailing.
Anticipation hums beneath my skin. A house fire isn’t something I’d wish on my worst enemy, but fighting one is a rare thrill.
And right now, it’s a welcome distraction.
“Are the inhabitants accounted for?” Scotty asks over the radio.
“Neighbors report it’s abandoned but we can’t rule it out,” Chief Greely replies.
The house is located in an older neighborhood I’m familiar with and not for good reasons. When we turn onto the street, a muted glow is coming from a two-story structure in the middle of the block. I clip my pack strap around my waist and slip on my gloves. Next to me, Hayes is already geared up except for his mask clipped to his shoulder strap.
On the front lawn of the first house on the right, people are milling around in the darkness. Most likely neighbors. The hydrant is in between it and the next house, which is dark.
“That’s the closest hydrant,” Scotty says, pointing with his radio.
“Got it,” I say.
Hickman continues toward the two-story house. The chief’s rig is parked on the other side of the driveway with his headlights trained on the house, illuminating the smoke rising from the back, which means there’s either a window or door open back there or the fire has self-vented through a roof space.
The windows are covered with decorative metal screens and draperies illuminated by the glow coming from inside the house.
