“I was signing a year, little sis.” She takes a deep breath.
“A year. Why the hell would I need a year?”
“You have so much to learn.”
2
KEITH
“You leaving for school?” I stand at the door and ask my daughter, who’s bent over the kitchen table, picking something from the fruit basket.
“Dad, you scared me!” Merida turns around, dropping the apple she just picked. She’s already grabbing her school bag, ready to bolt out the door.
The days when she used to joke about my catlike stealthiness are long gone. Now, in this house, we don’t joke, don’t laugh, just…survive.
“How’s school? Anything new?”
My words remind her of something, and she places her schoolbag on the dining table. I follow her every move as she unzips and takes out a notebook.
Day by day, my daughter is growing to look more and more like her mother. Her small, pointy ears, ocean-blue eyes, and round face all remind me of Melanie.
Mere waves a paper at me, saying something, but all my attention is on her naked wrist. She’s no longer wearing Melanie's wristwatch.
Since when?
Mere asked for her mother’s watch on her fourth birthday, one year after Mel’s passing. She promised me she’d never take it off.
My lungs constrict at the sight of my daughter chopping away another part of her mother from her life.
“Dad. Dad.” Mere lightly nudges my shoulder when I don’t respond.
“Yeah, yeah.” I clear my throat, shaking my head.
“Can you please sign here? I’m going to be late for school.” She hands me a pen as I skim the header Inter School Science Competition.
“You heard what I said, right, Dad?” Mere asks me suspiciously.
I nod.
What else can I do? I can’t tell her that while she was telling me about school, I was busy missing her mother. She already thinks I overdo it, maybe more than enough for both of us.
I glance back at her paper, and sign at the bottom of the page. She most likely stated the rules of the event. No cheating. No foul play.
My daughter doesn’t do that shit. She is the best fucking kid.
Not the happiest kid. But the best.
Mere is all set to leave when, like every morning, I ask her, “You have the trackers?”
She nods and points to the zip of her bag, where a small key chain–looking tracking device hangs.
“And the other?”
She picks her keys, which hide a second tracker, from the key chain holder by the door.
The recent case I’ve been working on deals with the abduction of teenage girls in the neighboring area, and that has made me more-than-usual concerned about Mere’s safety. If I could, I would have someone shadow her, but she’d never have it.
Merida halts at the door before stepping out and looks at me over her shoulder. “I’ll be fine, Dad.”