Sunday, 3rd August.

Z A C

It's never happened like this before. Not this fast. It's been a damn month since Addie turned up out of nowhere, just one month and I'm thinking about how to have a discussion about the future. It'll come on at unexpected moments. Pieces of internal dialogue.

Addie could make this her home. She could move her business here.

We should go on a proper date first I suppose.

How do I tell her that I'm crazy about her? Is there a good time when she's still grieving her sister so heavily?

I understood her grieving, wanted her to go at her own pace, heal in her own time. Sometimes I'd catch her, staring off into the distance, unmoving, unblinking, as if wherever her thoughts had taken her, were so captivating that it was difficult for her to come back.

She was improving too though. Less nightmares. Less tears. More smiles. And damn did she have a beautiful smile. One that made me stop and think, I've been right to wait for a woman to find me. I've been right not to rush it without feeling the connection that I feel when I'm with her.

I'm grateful to Willa too, for giving Addie a chance. Selfishly, I'm hopeful that having Willa here will encourage Addie to hang around in Texas. If she wanted to go home, well, I couldn't stop her. I wouldn't have the right to. But if she's here for Willa, I won't be disappointed. I wondered how their afternoon together was going, if they'd found something to do, shared stories of the lives that had been lived apart, connected over common interests.

Would Will tell Addie that she's allergic to the coloring in red foods? It makes her throw up. Would Addie tell Willa that she uses whatever is within arms reach as a book mark. On Tuesday, I saw her slip a sock in between the pages of her novel because there was nothing else close.

Or perhaps she'd tell Willa that she recites the alphabet when she's twisting an apple stem. Whichever letter it pops off at, she smiles and announces that her fate is in the apples stem. I have no idea what she's talking about but it's entertaining to watch.

Or that whenever Addie is outside and she thinks no one is watching, she slips Midge and Toto pieces of bacon from breakfast, even if it meant that she didn't get to eat hers. Or that she's nicknamed all of the chickens down at the coop and compliments them on their fine eggs whenever she goes to collect them for Blake.

Or that she's been making little three flower bouquets from the garden, wrapping them in ribbon and leaving them on all of our pillows. Or that she treats the plants and the flowers with so much tender respect that it's captivating. As if they're intelligent and alive with a total comprehension of emotions. She cares for those plants better than I've seen humans care for each other.

She's made this her home and I love it. The thought of going back to the house to find her either eating dinner or curled up with a book or chatting to pops, it makes it easier to slide the shed door closed before the sun has set and head back up the hill, a damn sap of a smile on my face when I think about how excited she'll be to tell me about her afternoon with Willa.

My hands were covered in grease and oil as I wandered through the back gate and latched it shut. Midget and Toto were snoozing on their kennel decks, getting the last of the sun that had peeped out after a long morning of rain and cloud. And then I heard her, heard her before I saw her. Sniffling and sobbing. Addie was in the grass beside the flower bed, knees to her chest, hair curtained around her shoulders.

"Ads," I called and made a quick jog over to her. She didn't move, she didn't peer up, she kept her chin on her knee and quietly sobbed so hard that her attempt to breathe sounded like choked whimpers. I knelt down in front of her and pushed her hair off her face. "Addie? What happened?"

I didn't want to panic, assume the worst. If something had happened to Will or Raine, even Milo, I'd have heard about it.

"I fucked up," she whispered. I had no idea what to think.

"How?"

She still wouldn't look at me, her wet lashes were aimed down, each blink pressed a new tear down her cheek and the darkness that I felt seeing that, the skies might as well have been thundering upon us again.

"Willa asked me about her birth father and I told her a censored version of the truth and said that we could look if she wanted to find him and then I told Milo about the conversation and he lost it and told me I couldn't see Will again."

My brows furrowed. That sure as hell didn't sound like Milo. The man has been level headed, fair, compassionate and decent from the moment that we met. But something must have happened in order for Addie to end up in this state and if she was telling the truth, I'd be fucking furious.

"Come on," I told her and stood, offering her a hand. She took it, her little palm in mine. It fit. It felt as if it were shaped to be there. "You want me to run a bath? You want a coffee or something to eat?"

"I think I'll just get into bed," she inhaled a deep breath as we walked upstairs and I nodded.

She slipped into her en-suite to get dressed, I sat on the edge of her bed, waiting, contemplating what I would say to Milo when I confronted him about this. Because it sure as hell wasn't just Addie he was hurting. I saw how excited Willa was to spend the afternoon with her birth mother.

Addie came out of her en-suite with her hair in a bun, a cami and shorts on and her face clean. Her cheeks were blotched and her lids were swollen but she wasn't sobbing anymore. Regardless, I could tell that she was distraught.

"Addie," I stood up as she came toward the bed, intending to slide under the covers and let sleep swallow her sorrow. She looked up at me and I stepped closer. Fuck, I didn't even know what to tell her, as if she needed to suffer more loss.

"I just—" she looked as if she was going to curl over, like the weight of the truth was too heavy and she couldn't shoulder it for another moment. I quickly reached out, a hand on the back of her head and pulled her into my chest where she fell apart all over again. "I just felt like this— this fucking ache was healing. Just for one second, I felt like— I don't know— whole again."

She was barely coherent. Her words were slurred and chopped and her sentences broke off at the end. But I understood. After what she'd lost, Willa was her second chance at happiness. At regaining a piece of herself that had been missing. Will couldn't replace Margo, but with so many pieces of her heart being stolen, getting one back was bound to assist in its beating.

I had to fix this.

I laid down with her and held her tight until she fell asleep, right there, in my arms. Even in sleep, her brow was worried and her lip was dropped. With one elbow keeping me propped up, I ran a finger along the length of her cheek, her freckles more prominent than when she arrived. One persons peace and happiness had never been so important to me. If I could shoulder what she feels, if I could take it from her, I would.

"Milo," I barged straight inside and winced when I considered that Willa might be asleep. It didn't stop me for long though. The hall, the living room, the kitchen it all passed me in a rushed blur as I searched for him, finally spotting him in the garden with Raine.

The back deck creaked when I stepped outside, alerting them to my presence. They sat at the garden table under a tree, solar lights hanging from the branches illuminated their startled profiles.

"Zac," Raine stood up fast. "What are you doing here? Is dad alright?"

Milo didn't look surprised to see me, I narrowed my glare as he slowly stood up, accepting whatever was about to go down.

"What the hell man?" I threw my arms wide and walked toward him, ignoring Raine who stared with utter confusion. "What the fuck is the deal? You on some sort of power trip?"

He scoffed. "I'm Willa's father. I don't need to power trip. If I decide that Addie is no good for her, I decide. You don't get to come here and attempt hero because you've got your damn hand in her pants."

"That has nothing to do with it," I snapped, now toe to toe with him. "She didn't do a damn thing wrong. You realise you're hurting Willa in all of this too, right? She gets the chance to get to know her birth mom and you rip it from her five minutes later."

"This might seem shocking to you, Zac, but it's none of your fucking business."

"What the hell is going on?!" Raine stepped between us, pushing her palm against my shoulder. "Zac?"

"Ask him."

Milo swallowed and his frustration morphed as he looked at Raine with a slight semblance of guilt and regret. That was no doubt because he was about to explain his fuck up to his fiancée and realise how ridiculous he sounded.

"Addie told Willa that she'd help her find her birth father. It's irresponsible to promise her things like that without talking to me. So I told her that she shouldn't see Willa no more."

Raine's lips parted. "Milo," she breathed. "No, no that's not— there must be more—"

"Willa asked," I interrupted and glared at Milo. "Willa asked about him. What, you thought she wouldn't? Don't be stupid. Of course she was going to ask. And maybe Addie shouldn't have said what she did but she made a mistake, and she told you about it. She's learning here too. She's not malicious or out to steal your daughter. This is you being insecure."

"Of course I'm insecure," Milo shouted, his face changing to a shade of red that I'd never seen on the man. "Addie is young and she's got a lot in common with Will. What happens when Will is old enough to do what she wants and she realises that she wants Addie?! Huh? What happens when Addie is the parent that she wants and Willa fucking leaves me?! Because she'll get old enough to do that and I won't be able to stop it!"

I didn't know what to tell him, it stunned me into silence because while I suspected it had something to do with his fears, I didn't expect him to be so vulnerable.

"Milo," Raine stood in front of him and spoke in a soft tone that had me stepping back a little to give them a sense of aloneness. "Keeping her from Addie is going to do more damage to her relationship with you, than if you let them spend time together."

Milo watched her, uncertain. "You're going to push her into Addie's arms. Because like you said, one day, she'll be old enough to make her own decisions and she'll resent you for stealing more of her time with Addie than she's already lost."

He took a deep breath and dropped his gaze to the ground. I was glad that Raine was here because she had the words that I didn't.

"Keep on being her father," Raine continued. "She loves you. Just keep being the father that she loves and she'll grow up having so much respect for the fact that you accommodated this friendship that she clearly craves. It's natural for her to want to know Addie. That doesn't mean that she wants to replace you."

It was hard to tell but it looked like what Raine had said might have resonated with him.

He turned his attention on me and glowing garden lights gave him a sinister shadow, his hardened features dark. "You don't come into our home and shout at me like that, ever again. Understood. Especially when it comes to Willa."

I scoffed. "You're a great dad. But I won't hesitate to tell you when you're being a fuck up. If you're not open to hearing where you're falling short, perhaps you're not the father I thought you were."

"Zac," Raine murmured.

Instead of waiting to hear how disappointed my big sister was in me, I turned around and went back inside, intending to leave.

No, I couldn't claim to know how it felt being in Milo's position, hard I'm sure but the fuel behind my frustration was entirely to do with the fact that how he handled it, impacted Willa too.

Addie's tears might have been an encouraging factor, but Addie's tears would dry. She's an adult, she hurts and she feels enormous amounts of ache and loss but Willa is a child.

She fundamentally can not be expected to know how to navigate these emotions. She needs the adults in her life to put her above all else and I'll be damned if I don't do what I can to see that Milo does that.

"Uncle Zac?"

I whirled around to see Willa sitting on the bottom of the stair case in her night gown. A white one with flower lace and a ribbon on the collar. She looked as if she'd stepped straight out of the shining. Just, not quite as horrific.

Well, not horrific at all. Angelic. Perhaps a better comparison would be that movie she's in love with. Pride and Prejudice. It looks like something one of those sisters would wear.

"How's it going, Will?" I slipped a hand in my jean pocket and attempted casual. Not that there was much point. She'd heard.

"Does my daddy think that I don't love him now?" She tilted her head to the side and blinked at the ground. "Maybe I shouldn't see Addie."

I palmed my jaw and sighed. What the hell did I even tell her? As mature as she seemed, as elegant as her taste in movies is, as advanced as her reading age is, she's a kid. "No, Will. He doesn't think that. Head up to bed."

"Can you give something to Addie for me?"

My gaze went into the living room. I could just see the ranch slider in the kitchen. It was still closed, how I had left it, so I shrugged and gestured upstairs. "Sure. Quick."

She raced ahead of me, light footsteps pattering on the tile. Her bedroom overlooked the back garden, so I went straight for the window and peered down, just able to the silhouette of Raine and Milo, embraced under the edge of the moving tree leaves.

Willa was rummaging around on her stained wood, antique desk. It was covered in books, colouring pens, paper. Her bed frame was a similar shade of stained wood, distressed and old with a simple white comforter and coffee stained colored throw pillows.

She had a wooden rocking chair in the corner, a book shelf with titles from the 1800's. Damaged spines and withering edges. The entire room felt like a step back in time.

I sat on her bed and rested my elbows on my knees, rubbing my hands over my face. That entire ordeal left me exhausted.

"Don't you have school tomorrow, kid?"

Willa peered up from her search and shrugged.

"It's almost nine."

"Well, I was sleeping until all the hollering woke me up," she widened her accusatory stare at me and I recoiled.

"Attitude."

She smiled and held up a piece of paper, handing it to me with a sheepish smile. The drawing wasn't bad but it took me a little bit of squinting and twisting the paper before Willa sighed with disappointment and started pointing at the characters on the page.

"This is Addie, this is me, this is all the children at the library. She read to the library kids today. Well, she was reading to me first and then all of them joined in and the librarian asked if she would come back."

I looked up at her and grinned. "Yeah?"

"Yeah. It was really fun! She's good at reading out loud. She changes her voices and does silly faces and stuff."

Damn, did this girl look on top of the world. "You like having her around then?"

She nodded and sat down on the bed beside me. "It's nice because she really wants to be my friend too. It feels really nice to know that she missed me and she didn't give me up because she didn't want me. I just want to be her friend. I wouldn't want to leave my dad."

"You should tell him that, kid. He'd appreciate hearing it."

Her gaze fell down and she slipped her hands underneath her thighs. "I don't know," she shrugged. "He seems weird about it. I'm scared to tell him that I'm really excited about spending time with Addie in case it hurts his feelings."

"Your dad might not mind yelling at me, but he wouldn't be like that with you. He wants you to talk to him. That's what all parents want. So I hear."

She smiled but soon it was a yawn and I gave her a nudge. "Into bed, Will. School tomorrow."

At home, I left the picture on Addie's pillow. Next to her sleeping head.