Winona sniffs. “They’re safe?”
“Very, very safe.”
Winona nods, still tearful, but she stares out at the scenery more like Sulli did. Ryke distracts Winona by taking out her stuffed sea turtle.
She hugs Simon like she’s protecting him from the zoo’s fences.
Sulli hops off the bench. “Can we see the monkeys before we leave?”
“Sure thing,” I say.
Bethany left us with a map, so we find our way around the zoo alone. It’s easier for Ryke to carry Winona, so he props her on his side with only one hand. She rests her cheek on his arm, a little mopey and downtrodden.
In time, she’ll feel better, so we don’t push and prod and try to yank a smile out of Winona. I walk backwards with Sulli, our smiles rising, and Ryke directs us which way to go.
“Fucking right,” he says.
“Not fucking left?” I tease—then I accidentally trip over my own feet.
Ryke catches my wrist, keeping me upright, and his brows rise as my smile appears.
“So you didn’t say fucking down then?”
Ryke eats me alive with his gaze.
“You’re in L-O-V-E,” Sulli singsongs, still walking backwards, the monkey and ape exhibits in sight.
His arm slides across my shoulders, and I clutch his hand that drapes down. “Did you hear, we’re in L-O-V-E?” I ask him. “What will my husband say?”
Ryke almost smiles. “That he’s in fucking L-O-V-E with you too.”
“My husband would’ve said it just like that.”
He pushes my cheek lightly with the same hand that I hold.
Sulli rotates as we reach the noisy monkey and ape habitats. Trees rustle, dark green foliage cascading. We all stand by the glass, silent as we watch. Ryke lets Winona down, and she puts her nose up close, fingertips against the window.
“Look.” Sulli points to four chimpanzees swinging from branch-to-branch, squeaking to one another. “It’s us.”
We all laugh together, and mine transforms into an overwhelmed smile. I look to Ryke, but I can’t do anything but nod at him—you know those moments where you’re just so full you can barely breathe? So full of feelings you only hope to meet.
They crash against me like freefalling. Like cliff diving and bungee jumping. Like screaming at the top of my lungs. Like one-hundred-and-fifty miles per hour.
All with Ryke Meadows.
He holds my cheeks with both large, rough hands, and I reach up and hold his with my small, soft.
Ryke laughs into his own beautiful smile, and he says, “This is our fucking life, Calloway.”
Every moment is wild, even the quiet ones.
April 2028
Zoo
Utah
RYKE MEADOWS
In another fucking lifetime, in another world, Daisy is alone.
I’m alone.
We have no girls, no fucking kids to call our own—and it’s just not what’s here today. It’s not what I feel when I wake up in the morning. It’s not what I feel when I go to fucking bed.
I’m not alone.
I have a fucking family.
Daisy radiates beneath my hands, holding her face like she holds mine. And I kiss the most beautiful fucking thing on this Earth. Her smile pulls one from me, from the dark, lonely crevices.
Winona gags, and our eyes open on her—just as she says, “Old people kissing are so gross.”
Sulli smiles, but she’s busy clucking her tongue at the four chimpanzees.
I rest my arm on Daisy’s head while she nuzzles against my ribs like a fucking bear. “You think we’re fucking old?”
“So old,” Winona says, her stink-face ending with a smile. I’m glad she’s not as fucking sad.
“How old?” Daisy asks while I slip my hand up the back of her shirt.
Winona kicks a twig. “Eighty-four.” That’s incredibly fucking wrong.
Daisy looks up, and very quietly, only audible to me, she says, “You’ve been fucking an eighty-four-year-old. How does that feel?”
“Feels like we’re finally the same fucking age.”
Daisy laughs a full-bellied laugh. “Touché.”
We spend the next thirty minutes hanging around the monkey exhibit. Winona plops down by the glass and captures the fucking attention of an orangutan. “He’s orange like me!” Winona exclaims before watching intently as the animal inspects her from afar.
The orangutan might be fucking confused by her giraffe onesie. While our girls do their own thing with the animals, I film them with our video camera—and I fucking flirt with my wife.
In the last ten minutes, we watch Sulli who has grown really fucking quiet, no longer clucking or whistling. She searches left and right and scratches at her neck. Then she finds a bench nearby the staff exit and takes a seat, pulling her legs up to her chest.
I turn the video camera off and stuff it into my backpack. “Let’s fucking ask,” I tell Dais.
She nods, her flower crown halfway off her head after I messed her hair. I catch her wrist before she rushes ahead, and I situate the crown on the fucking top of her head while we approach our daughter together.
“Sullivan?” Daisy slides next to our daughter on the bench. Sulli rests her forehead on her knees, and Daisy rubs her back, searching Sulli as fucking quickly as I do.
I take my baseball hat off and run a hand through my hair—fuck.
I know this position. I’ve seen Daisy in it more than enough times. I put my hat back on. It’s not casual legs-to-chest—it’s a fucking pained, upright fetal position.
Sulli mumbles something.
“We can’t fucking hear, sweetie.” I stay standing above them, and Winona starts hopping over to us. She hangs onto the armrest of the bench, peering up at Sullivan.
“Sulli?” Winona whispers.
Sullivan lifts her head, fucking pale. I put my hand on her forehead while she mumbles out, “My stomach hurts.”
She’s not warm.
“How about we go to the bathroom?” Daisy says. “Maybe it was the extra whipped cream on your pancakes.”
“But Sulli always eats extra whipped cream,” Winona says, open-mouthed in confusion. Then in a quick fucking flash, she crawls beneath the bench and out the other side, racing to our backpack.
“Winona!” I yell. Fucking A. “Don’t go any fucking farther than that backpack!” When it comes to their safety, I’m a bigger hardass. To this day, we’ve never let them do anything dangerous that I didn’t do at their fucking age.
She screeches to a halt and waits there.
Daisy helps Sulli stand, our daughter nearly doubled-over.
I shake my head, thinking this is more than a stomachache. Her fucking appendix. “Sul, do you want me to fucking carry you?”
“No,” she sighs like Dad but winces again. “I’m ten…I’m not a baby anymore.”
She fucking reminds me at least once a week. We regroup and locate a bathroom about two minutes back. In agonized determination, Sulli walks to the bathroom on her own, Daisy rubbing her back all the way. Winona holds my pinky finger while she hops.
I must only wear dark fucking concern because Winona asks, “Is Sulli okay?”
“Yeah.” I nod a few times, but the truth is, I don’t fucking know.
We reach the bathrooms, and Daisy tries to open the women’s door. She jiggles the locked knob. Fucking really? I try the men’s door.
“It’s open.”
Besides employees, the zoo is still fucking empty and so is the men’s bathroom. Four urinals and only two stalls. Sulli quickly slips into one, and I keep an eye on Winona who drifts from my side.
“Why are there strange looking water fountains?” Winona asks, hopping over to the urinals. I fucking scoop her up in my arms.
“Those are fucking urinals.” I flip her upside-down, hanging my daughter by the feet.
She shrieks in laughter, and I concentrate partially on Daisy, who asks Sulli i
f everything’s okay through the stall. Dais glances back to me, worried.
Really fucking worried.
I upright Winona in my arms, and she spits hair from her mouth. I keep her close, supporting her against my chest with only one hand.
“Mom, can you come here?” Sulli asks, fear pitching her voice.
I want to fucking go, to help, but she asked for her mom, so I wait. Daisy disappears inside, and Winona grows quiet, blinking at the blue stall.
She whispers up to me, “I don’t think Sulli’s okay, Daddy.”
Fuck this. I near the stall and knock. “What the fuck’s going on?” I need to know if I should call 9-1-1 or if it’s mild like puke.
“It’s okay,” Daisy calls out to me. “We’ll be out in a second.” She sounds hurried, and I might be fucking pushy, but I don’t push here.