Chapter dedication: simplelies

Song of recommendation for the chapter: Stuck with you - Ariana Grande ft Justin Bieber 🎶 🎶

"Gentlemen, this is the complete design for the new company building," Chris gestured to the projector, his gaze strayed to his wrist watch.

6:00 p.m.

Dammit.

He was running late for his dinner with Lee. He promised to pick her up from her bakery, and he still had to get home to shower and swap his clothes before heading to Harlem. He'd never make it in time. And Lee was still skeptical about him, what if she changed her mind again?

Mr. Shaun Allan, the owner of Allan Holdings, nodded his head at the projector; his face remained blank. "I will have to discuss the plans with the board of directors. If they decide that they want this design, I'll let you know."

Chris nodded. "Fair enough. If that's all sir, can I leave now?" Rude? He knew.

There were plenty of jobs in the world, but the world had one Lee.

Mr. Allan rose to his feet and extended his hand. "Yes, we're done here, Mr. Ross. I'll get back to you."

Chris shook his hand with a smile that didn't reach his eyes, waited until the man left the conference room before grabbing his stuff and exiting the room. He rushed out into the evening sun and jogged to his car. A couple of men in suits looked at him and then started whispering between themselves. Chris ignored them, his mind on where he was going to. Another glance confirmed twenty five minutes was gone.

After a half hour of craptastic traffic on the road, he pulled up in front of his building. He could have used the underground lot, but he was in too much of a hurry.

For a second he just breathed. I’ve got a date. I've got a date. Just the thought of Lee's beautiful lips and undemanding humor jump-started his heart again.

Chris bounded up the steps made his way to the elevator, nodding in greeting at the receptionist. The elevator dinged open on his floor, he hurried towards it and threw open the door. Amanda's five year old son looked up from his omnipresent colour book.

Crap.

He forgot he was on babysitting duty tonight. But his sister promised to bring their usual babysitter for when he's at work. Where was she?

Chris crossed to the sofa and ruffled his dark hair.

"Good boy. Get it done now and you'll have lots of time to play." He looked around. "Where's your babysitter?"

"Don' know."

"What the he—heck? Have you been by yourself?"

"Only a couple of minutes before you came. Mummy brough' me and gave me a snack."

"Dammit, Mandy," he mumbled. "That was nice. Wonder why Jane's not here. She's always so responsible." He shrugged and walked into the bedroom.

"You going out?" he called from the living room.

"Yes, a friend is making dinner for me."

"Cool. Mummy says you need to meet more friends who can cook."

Chris laughed, and a few pounds of crap slid off his shoulders.

"Who's staying with me?" Daniel scurried into the bedroom and leaped onto the bed.

"Jane's who mummy and I lined up." Chris stared into his closet. "I'm surprised she's not here already."

Like the answer of the oracle, his cell phone rang. He looked down with trepidation. "Jane, are you okay?"

"Oh, Mr. Ross, I'm so sorry." She sounded weak and awful. "I got something, maybe the flu and they took me to the hospital. Mom didn't know I promised to come to your place so she didn't know to call."

The sound of barfing echoed through the phone, and he held it away from his ear.

"So sorry."

"No problem, Jane. Just get better."

"Th-thanks." More barfing before the line went dead.

"Well, damn."

"You said a naughty word," Daniel sniffed. He held out a palm.

Chris groaned as he reached for his wallet, withdrew a dollar note and slapped it into the little palm. He had to bite his tongue to keep from laughing at the serious look on Daniel's face as he folded the money and shoved it in the pocket of his jeans.

"She sounded bad." Daniel rolled on the bed backward and then forward like some armadillo and ended sitting on his butt.

Chris sat on the bed next to him and started calling backups. Fifteen minutes later, he threw in the towel. Hell and damnation.

Daniel rolled onto his side. "I'm really sorry."

"Me too." He sighed as he dialed the phone.

Lee's voice danced with humor. "Hey, Chris, aren't you supposed to be someplace now? Like here?"

"My sister dropped her son off, I forgot that was supposed to happen today. Now I have a five year old kid in my house and the sitter I use got the flu and I tried to get a sub. It seems Tuesday night is popular for the babysitting profession. I really am sorry. I was looking forward to it. We'll have to cancel tonight."

"Have you eaten?"

"No."

"Has your nephew?"

"Uh, no. I'm just about to feed him."

"This is totally up to you, and I won't be offended if you say no, but bring him along. Free Food and a movie. We can mark tonight as a fail for the challenge, but that doesn't mean we can't have fun."

Could he introduce his nephew to Lee? They weren't steady enough to be introducing each other to their family.

He looked at Daniel. The kid needed a night out too. Amanda and her husband were too uptight and didn't let the kid go out that much. What if the kid told his parent about Lee?

"Okay." He almost bit the words back, but his rebellious spirit wanted to go see Lee. Laugh and eat. "Yeah. Okay."

"I'm cooking. See you in a few."

He hung up and stared at the phone. "Want to go have dinner with my friend?"

Daniel scooted so his face lay just beneath the phone. "You serious? He invited me?"

"Yes."

Daniel leaped up in one of those anime moves of his. "Uncle Chris, this is one cool dude, and I am majorly hungry."

The kid was an enigma. Sometimes he had issues pronouncing words, even the simplest ones. Another time he used big words that baffled the adults.

Chris smiled— then laughed. "Yep, I'm majorly hungry too."

  
*

Lee stirred the sauce and turned the heat lower, then added grated cheese to the salad— kids loved cheese—and crossed to the mini fridge to check her supply of milk and soft drinks.

Take a deep breath, girl. How scary can one five year old be?

As she hurried up the stairs to her room, she stopped to check the condition of her room. Nothing incriminating. Good. Then she moved on to the bedroom. Sadly her nice clean sheets wouldn't get admired tonight, but this was more important. Chris was introducing her to his family, albeit a small kid, but it was important. Kids could make adults like you if you play your cards right.

Genuinely, of course.

She pulled her work T-shirt over her head and replaced it with a clean one, then walked to the small bathroom slash toilet, brushed her teeth, and checked her hair. It would get in the way of cooking and serving, so she pulled it back in a ponytail.

She stopped and stared in the mirror. The person looking back was her own creation — light makeup, pink shiny lips, elongated lashes, the courtesy of mascara, eyeliner and powder. She looked the ultimate fantasy. The shop bell rang, her heart leaped, and with a quick grin at her reflection, she hurried to let in the maybe man of her dreams.

She paused at the front door to arrange her expression —friendly but cool. This was a kid, after all. Lee pulled it open. Chris flashed all kinds of teeth. The kid next to him stared up at Lee with wide eyes and a slightly open mouth.

Okay, maybe he wasn't told about her. "Hey, you guys, come on in." She stepped back and let Chris guide the kid into the bakery.

"Sure does smell good in here. Doesn't it, Daniel?"

The boy nodded but kept glancing at Lee's face.

Lee knelt beside Andy. Thank God she had enough sense to wear jeans. "Hi there, little fella. My name is Ledia, but you can call me Lee. Would you like to be my friend?"

Daniel gave her a look like he was weighing to be sure Lee wasn't joking, then grinned and nodded. "You don't have friends? Uncle Chris says you're friend."

"I am his friend, but I want to be yours too. And yes, I have three friends, but they're all girls. I want to big, strong boy like you so you can be my Prince Charming."

Daniel's eyes widened. "Really?"

"Yep. My very own Prince Charming." Lee glanced up at Chris, who smiled softly.

Daniel looked nothing like his uncle.

Daniel's curly blond hair, blue eyes, angelic features, and slim body contrasted with Chris, who was dark-haired, not a curl in sight, amber-eyed, and sturdier framed.

Chris chuckled. "Uh, Daniel, this is my friend Ledia. Your princess in distress."

Daniel speared her with his blue, lovely eyes. "Yeah. I will be your Prince. . . I can't remember his name."

Lee laughed as stood up. "Come sit down." She led them up to her little loft above the bakery. They all walked into the living room, and Chris and Daniel sat on the worn sofa. "I've got beer, wine, soda, iced tea, milk. Can I get you a beer, Daniel?"

"Children only take milk and juice, silly," Daniel howled. "Yes, I'll take two."

"How about some organic natural lime soda instead?"

Daniel crossed his arms and made a big show. "Oooo-kay."

"Topher?"

"Beer, please."

"You call my uncle Topher?"

"Yeah." Lee walked into the open kitchen. "Why do you ask?"

"I don't know. He doesn't like it. He's pretty hung up on his—" He lowered his voice and frowned. "—professional image."

"Daniel!" Chris hollered but laughed just as hard as Lee.

"My mummy says he's a rec. . .rec loose?"

"Recluse." Lee corrected him.

"Yeah, that word. He's not mean." Daniel rocked back on the couch and chortled. "But he's soft like my teddy bear, Milo."

"Daniel, I'm not going to have any secrets left." Chris looked at Lee and smiled.

Lee took a deep breath to keep her hormones from going into overdrive. She poured the soda and beer for Chris and juice for herself, left one beer on the island, and carried the others to the coffee table.

Daniel took his soda. "Thank you." He sipped. "Hey, this is good." Then his face got serious. "Do you live here? You bake cakes? I saw it on that board outside. Is that what you do? Is it? Is it? Do you like snakes?"

Lee snorted. This kid was a force of nature. "Uh, yeah, I live here and I bake cakes. Now, your second question. I kind of like snakes. How about you?"

"Yes, I think I do. Haven't seen too many."

"Maybe we'll go to the zoo sometime." Lee glanced at Chris and saw the slightest flicker of a frown.

"Oh heck, that'd be sooo rad."
Daniel grinned. "I have a mummy. Do you have a mummy?"

"No."

"That's unusual."

Chris put a hand on his nephew's leg. "Daniel, enough with the twenty question."

"Ooo-kay. What's for dinner?"

Chris raised his hands. "I give up."

They all laughed.

Lee walked back to the kitchen. "How does spaghetti with meatballs sound?"

"Delicious."

"Glad to hear it."

Chris asked, "What can we do to help?" He and Daniel piled into the kitchen making it smaller than it was already, and Lee showed them where the dishes were kept.

Fifteen minutes later, they all sat around the table chowing down on spaghetti.

"Lee, where are you—"

Chris held up a hand. "Stop. Your turn to answer questions. So how was school today?"

Daniel shrugged. "Okay.  But that kid with the X name I can't pronounce still can't keep his hands to himself, but I tried to turn the other cheek. That's what Grandma said I should do."

Chris' lips tightened, but he didn't say anything.

Lee glanced at Daniel, who busily sucked strings of pasta into his mouth with accompanying sound effects. "Some other kid giving you a hard time?"

Daniel shrugged. "Yeah. He's a bully to everybody, but I guess his mother told him not to play with me since my parents don't take care of me and that I am bad and that my family is—" He tapped his jaw with a faraway look in his eyes, then he grinned. "Wacky. I don't know the meaning, but I know it's a mean word."

Chris looked like someone hit him with a stick. Hell, how crappy would it be to have someone treat your kid bad because of your family? Shit! "So how do you feel about this kid?"

Daniel chewed thoughtfully. "He makes me mad because he's, like, insulting my family and me, right? But I know he's got these really bad parents, so I don't want to hate him. He's got a few friends who are like him —mean and nasty. But I've got more. Friends, I mean."  He smiled. "Yesterday, he came up and punched me on the arm and called me stupid and my friend Anna, who's bigger than either of us, went over and slapped him. Gosh, he was really surprised. Miss Parker pretended she didn't see. It was so cool." He laughed.

"It sounds like you've got this under control."

"Yeah," Daniel nodded. "I'll tell mummy and daddy if it's not." He added with a mumbled, "when they are at home."

How did this fifty-year-old philosopher end up in a five-year-old's body?

Lee looked at Chris over Daniel's head and mouthed, "Wow."

The topic switched to soccer, which Daniel loved, and baseball, which he hated. Lee took some plates to the kitchen and started dishing up cookie dough ice cream. She looked back at the table, where Chris and Daniel laughed over the total boredom of baseball. Like somebody captured a moment from her dreams and crystalized it into reality. A family who ate together, laughed, shared their days, teased, solved problems. An entity as rare as a unicorn in Lee's life. She blinked hard against the heat pressing behind her eyes.

Just dish dessert, Lee.

As she walked into the little dining area, Daniel looked up. "Hey, Lee thank you for dinner. It was really good. Oh wow! Is that cookie dough?"

"Sure is. Want to take dessert to the couch and start a movie?"

"Yay! Yeah, what have you got?"

"What do you like? How many times have you seen Shrek?"

"Really? I love Shrek!"

"Okay. Sherek it is," Chris said, "first, let's help clear the rest of the table."

Daniel glanced at his ice cream longingly but hopped up and had everything off the table except the wooden finish in a matter of seconds, and then he grabbed his dish and hurried to the couch.

Chris whispered, "You're pretty amazing."

Lee gave him a gentle kiss. "I aim to please."

She didn't say she would have happily given up a year of life just for the joy of the evening.

A/N:

Don't you just love Daniel? That kid could chat up a storm, I swear. I don't know if all five year old behave like that, but this one does.

So, sorry if you feel differently.

Did you enjoy the little POV from Chris?

QTOC: what do you think about the dinner date?

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