Chapter Eight
Leo
I tell Carl all about it. It isn’t my intention but as we sit in his office in the morning, hours before opening, it all pours out.
Carl listens, and when I’m done, he says, “You’re always saying you’re worried about not being a good enough Daddy for her, but the truth is, that’s bullshit.”
I stare at him in a bit of shock. “What the hell, man?”
“Total bullshit,” he says. “You’re afraid, but it’s not about whether or not you’re a good Daddy. You’re afraid she’ll leave you, hurt you like you’ve been hurt before. This isn’t about her. It’s about you.”
I am ready to argue with him about it but my shoulders slump as I realize he’s right. “God,” I say. “It sucks to be afraid.”
“If she carried on the way you do, you’d probably give her a nice hard spanking,” he says. “And it would be good for her. Well, there’s no way in hell I’m going to spank you, so you better find a way to spank yourself because I’m gonna tell you something.”
“What?”
“If you let yourself be afraid like this, you’re going to turn into a Daddy who’s not good for her at all.”
His words hang in the air like a pronouncement of doom, and the hardest thing about it all is I know he’s right. He’s absolutely right. I don’t have any right to be caught up in all this fear and worry.
“Listen, man,” Carl says. “You know exactly what to do. You know how to be the right kind of a Daddy and from what I can see, you’ve done it. That little girl of yours is blossoming and happy. Rollie says it’s the first time since she’s known Helen that Helen has been happy.”
“My God,” I breathe out.
“Yeah. That’s what you’ve done, no matter how much you like to pretend you’re some failure as a man. You’ve turned her life around and given her a chance to be what she wants to be. There are times I look at you and wish I had your wisdom and your approach, you know?”
“You look at me like that?” Carl is the finest man I know. Such a proclamation is astounding.
“Damned right I do,” he replies. “I don’t know how in the hell you manage to do everything you ought to do as a Daddy, and as a man, and still wallow in all this self-pity like some kind of fuck up. Get the hell over yourself and take care of your little girl, for Christ’s sake.”
I stand and say, “Catch you later, man.”
“Think about what I said.”
“I already have.”
I leave his office, cross through the dim unlit bar and head to the dressing room and the back door to Helen’s apartment. I knock on the door, heart racing and mind reeling. I hear her fiddling with the door and when she sees it’s me, her eyes light up. “Daddy!” she says with a smile and throws her arms around me.
I push her back. She looks at me, worried, and her face grows a little frightened. “Did I do something wrong?”
“I love you, little girl,” I say. “I love you, and I love your more than I can even understand.”
She looks stunned, and wet, like she’s just been hit with a thousand water balloons. I realize suddenly she’s wrapped in a towel and my shirt is soaked from when she hugged me. She swallows hard and whispers, “You do?”
“I want you to be my little girl forever,” I say. “I want that and it scares me because I don’t know if you want it and I don’t know if I’ll be good enough but, damn it, you’re my little girl and I love you.”
“Oh, Daddy,” she whispers. Her arms go around me again and she whispers, “I love you and I want that!” She kisses my neck and says, “and…I’m scared, too.”
I step forward, carrying her along with me, and kick the door closed. She’s still holds onto me, but her towel falls to the floor in the process. “Let’s be scared together, little girl.”
I lift her up and she wraps her legs around me and her arms around me as I carry her inside. “Are you my little girl?” I growl.
She breathes in sharply and lets it out in a soft moan. “Oh, God. Yes, Daddy!” she says.
“Forever, little girl?”
“Always and forever, Daddy!”