She stops outside of Athena’s bedroom door, which has been left slightly ajar. Not giving any thought to Athena’s privacy, Peony pushes the door open and enters the room.
I stand motionless in the doorway, watching her wander around the room like she’s on a mission. “I don’t think we should go in there, Princess Peony. That’s Athena’s room. It’s private.”
“Nina.” Peony points at the bed and drops to her knees next to it.
Like the rest of the house, Athena’s bedroom is immaculately tidy. The only messy thing about her room is her bed. Her bedding is askew, haphazardly dangling over the side, forming a small puddle of sheets on the floor.
“You think Daisy’s under there?” I gesture to the queen-sized bed.
Peony attempts to push the bedding aside, like branches of a weeping willow hiding a cave entrance.
I kneel next to her and lift the curtain of bedding. “Do you see it?”
Peony lies on her stomach and peers under the bed. Giggling, she stretches toward what I’m guessing is Daisy.
But it seems to be too far out of her reach, unless she’s planning to crawl under the bed to retrieve it.
“I’ll get it,” I tell her and flatten onto my stomach.
Blindly groping, I move my hand along the floor, searching for the stuffed elephant. The familiar ache in my shoulders and back protests the awkward movement.
As I breathe through the pain, wishing orgasms were in my near future, my fingers brush against a book.
Peony’s bright eyes shine at me, and she giggles. “Daisy!”
Oh, Daisy isn’t a toy. It’s a character in one of Peony’s picture books.
I slide the book from under the bed. But it’s not a board book like I was expecting. It’s a sketch pad with a flat metal box sitting on top. A metal box containing colored pencils. The quality kind artists use.
Peony shifts to a sitting position and pats the book, as if that will magically open it.
Athena must be okay with Peony seeing whatever’s inside it. Otherwise, Peony wouldn’t know about the book. I ignore the voice telling me it still doesn’t give me the right to be in Athena’s room, and I open the book to the first page.
A breathtaking drawing of a young woman’s face stares at me. Her straight black hair frames delicate features, and long dark eyelashes accentuate sad eyes. But the most heartbreaking part is that the girl has no mouth. She has a nose and those expressive blue eyes, but it’s as if Athena never got around to drawing the mouth.
Or she had another reason for leaving it out.
I flip through the next couple of pages. They contain more sketches of girls who could be in their late teens or early twenties. There’s something disturbing yet beautiful about each one.
I trace my finger over the green-eyed girl, as if that’s all it will take to erase her pain. These pictures and Athena’s talent don’t come as acomplete surprise. I remember the image she drew several months ago, when she came to Picnic & Treats and drew the sketch of a girl using only a crayon.
I turn the page. This time I’m not met by the exquisite eyes of a young woman. It’s a sad bunny that stares at me. It’s cute, like the kind of picture you would find in a children’s book.
Peony points at the bunny. “Daisy.”
Ahh. So this is the mysterious Daisy.
I keep flipping the pages, pausing on each one to appreciate what I’m looking at, only to eventually realize the pictures of the various woodland critters, in their natural habitat, represent some kind of story.
Peony points to the wolf, and her adorable face pinches into a scowl, like she just ate something bitter. “Bad.”
“Is he the villain?”
She doesn’t reply, but instead helps me turn to the next page, where more of the story plays out.
I flip past a few more pages to one with a bear on it.
Peony points at the drawing and scowls again. “Bad.”
