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I kiss her temple. “You're the best.”

“Who was that?” my dad asks. His displeased tone tells me he noticed the same details I did.

“Well,” I look back to the familiar car to find it quickly pulling out of the parking lot. I’m not surprised she’d go snatching receipts and speeding in an area with heavy foot traffic. “I think that’s the reason I haven’t gotten any sleep this week.”

Because that forest green Subaru has been parked in our designated parking lot for the last few days.

Dahlia and I spend two nights with my parents, which works out great. Their house is close enough to her school that my mother walked her down there yesterday, and she keeps telling me she wants to do it every morning. It won’t be happening fromourplace, because I’m not much of a walker as it is and we live about ten miles away. My mother was very vocal about how fine she’d be with us staying over more, and it’s extra nice to have that reassurance given our current situation.

I help my dad whip up some pancakes with fresh fruit on top. He’s the reason I fell in love with baking, always inviting me into the kitchen to help with whatever he was creating. It started as dumping things into a bowl, and he gave me more responsibility as time went on. Measuring, mixing, poking with a toothpick to make sure things were done in the middle.

I try to include Dahlia the way he did with me, but she isn’t a fan of following a recipe or splitting the tasks with me. She wantsto do it all, and she wants to do it her way. One of these days I’m going to let her, I just know she’s going to be so disappointed when the glob that goes into the oven is going to turn into nothing but a hot glob after forty minutes.

Or I could replace it with my own when she’s not looking so she thinks she’s a genius.

I watch as she sits at the table, and picks through the mixed berries on her plate for the strawberries. She not only neglects the rest of them, but the pancakes themselves.

I chuckle.

“Do you want more strawberries?”

“Yes, please,” she replies with wide eyes.

“Okay, I’ll get you more strawberries if you take two big bites of your pancakes.”

She doesn’t hesitate, filling her face before she’s even finished what was in her mouth.

Both of my parents shake their heads in disbelief, and I know exactly what they’re about to say.

“She listens way too well to be your kid,” my dad says with an amused smile.

“Seriously sunshine, how’d you manage that? We went to warto convince you to do anything at her age.”

”Yeah, yeah. I was a difficult child, let’s move on from that same old song, huh?”

They’re just teasing, of course, but they do ita lot.In reality, I think I just wanted to run around without shoes on all the time.

And Imayhave had a habit of trying to walk out the front door when no one was watching, but I never went further than the neighbors house. I just liked that they had so many flowers in their front yard. After the alarm of the first couple times, they even started helping me pick some to bring back to my parents. It was cute.

I kiss Dahlia’s head before setting a couple more sliced strawberries onto her plate.

“But I sure did get lucky.” I poke her cheek, so she knows she’s the reason.

Dahlia smiles and looks down as if the attention makes her shy, but I know it’s an act. She’s just too aware of how cute she is. She has a mom who will never let her forget it.

“What’s the plan tonight? Staying over again?”

I look to my mom with a frown.

“I think we’re going to head home and hope for the best, but don’t panic if you happen to hear someone unlocking the door in the middle of the night.”

“Noted,” they say at the same time. My parents are adorable.

I feel briefly relieved when I pull into my parking lot and find that the green Subaru isn’t in it. If I’m really lucky, it’ll stay gone all night.

Dahlia and I ran errands most of the day, and I finished it out by taking her to the mall so we could walk around, and ride every single one of their little coin operated rides. It was all an attempt to make sure she’d be extra tired tonight. When she lets out a big yawn as we walk up the steps, I feel like it was a mission accomplished.

My jaw clenches when I spot a piece of paper taped to my door.