Chapter 15 - After the Chapel Doors Closed
The apartment smelled like old carpet cleaner and pizza boxes when Daddy unlocked the door.
He carried our bag in one hand and kept his other hand on my back the whole way in. I didn't let go of her once. Not in the car. Not on the stairs. My arms were shaking by the time we got inside, but I just shifted her up higher on my chest and held the pink blanket tight under her chin. She was breathing soft against my cardigan, her reddish hair damp and sticking to her forehead.
It wasn't big like the chapel. Just a living room with a gray couch and a lamp with a crooked shade and tall windows with the blinds half down. The daylight was almost gone. He set the bag down and looked around like he hadn't been here in a long time.
"Sit here for me," he said, and patted the couch. "Right here where I can see you."
I sat. My light blue dress was wrinkled and my feet hurt. He pulled the coffee table closer and sat across from me on it, so our knees almost touched. His tuxedo jacket was open and his bow tie was loose. He looked tired.
He held out his hand. The thin silver chain was still in his palm from the chapel. He hadn't put it in his pocket.
"You gave this to me," he said quietly. "Do you remember where you got it?"
I nodded. My throat felt dry. "Mommy put it on me. Under my dress. She said if I found you, show you so you'd know it's us."
He swallowed. I watched his eyes get wet but he didn't cry like I did. He just breathed in through his nose.
"She was right," he said. "This was mine. I gave it to your mom a long time ago, before you were born. There's a little mark on the back. See?" He turned it over with his fingertip. I leaned forward without standing up, her weight still on me. "That's how I know. That's how I know you're telling the truth."
I felt something loosen in my chest. "So you are my daddy?"
He looked straight at me. "Yes," he said. Simple. No long pause. "I'm your daddy. And she's your sister. I'm sorry I wasn't there. I'm here now."
I nodded fast because I didn't want to start crying again and wake her. She moved a little and made a small sound, and I rocked her without even thinking.
He stood up then and went to the kitchen counter where he'd left his phone. He called somebody with it on speaker while he opened cabinets looking for something clean.
A woman answered. "Yeah?" she said.
"It's me," Daddy said. "I need help. I have my girls with me. My older one is seven and the baby is maybe a few months. I need a pediatric check tonight if you can come, and I need formula and diapers and a place for them to sleep."
There was a pause. Then the woman said, "Address?" He gave it. She said, "I'll be there in forty minutes. Keep the baby warm. Don't try to feed her anything weird."
"Thank you," he said, and hung up.
He found a clean T-shirt in a drawer and folded it into a square and set it on the couch next to me. "For spit-up," he said. "The nurse on the phone said the clinic can see her first thing tomorrow morning. We'll go together."
His phone buzzed on the counter. He glanced at it. I saw the name at the top. The blonde lady from the chapel. In her white dress with the veil.
He didn't pick it up. A message popped up underneath. He read it without touching it, then turned the phone face-down.
"What did she say?" I whispered.
He sat back down on the coffee table. "She said the wedding is off. She said she doesn't want us to call her again unless it's through lawyers. She said she hopes the kids are okay."
He said it plain, like he was reading a grocery list. "That part is over," he added. "You don't have to worry about her coming to take anybody out of anywhere."
I believed him because his voice didn't shake.
A little later there was a knock. The woman from the phone came with two grocery bags. She had gray hair pulled back and wore scrubs. She didn't ask a lot of questions. She washed her hands in the kitchen sink and checked her ears and her breathing with a small light while I still held her.
"You're doing a good job holding her," she told me. "She's a little hungry and tired, but her lungs sound good. You're keeping her safe."
She showed Daddy how to hold the bottle so she wouldn't choke, but he let me keep her in my arms while he held the bottom of it. She drank half and fell back asleep on my cardigan. The woman left extra diapers and a folded sleeper and said she'd see us at the clinic at nine.
After she left, Daddy locked the door. He brought a blanket from the bedroom and spread it over me and her together. He didn't try to take her to another room. He turned the lamp low and sat on the far end of the couch, close enough that his knee touched the cushion under my legs.
"I'll stay right here," he said. "All night. If she cries, we'll get up together. Tomorrow we'll get beds and food and all the real stuff."
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I leaned back into the corner of the couch. My eyes were so heavy I could barely keep them open, but I could feel her warm through the blanket and hear Daddy breathing next to us. The chain was on the coffee table where I could see it.
I didn't let go of her. I fell asleep holding her while he stayed.
