Page 22 of Priestly Sins
“I hate to ask this, and honestly I wouldn’t if I had any other choice, but since I don’t, here it goes.” She mumbles, “I can’t believe I’m doing this. Clara has early pickup today from preschool. Normally I’m able to plan and today something unexpected popped up... an order pickup I have to wait on. My mom’s tied up, and my friend, Gwen, whose daughter Sarah is Clara’s best friend, can’t. Sarah and Clara—I know it’s ridiculous. Can’t foresee this crap when you’re hormonal and swollen and trying to pick a name and… Sarah doesn’t need a ride, just Clara, and, seriously, I don’t even know who else to ask and…” And right in the middle of her thought, she just stops.
“Sirona?”
“Yeah?”
“I can pick up Clara. Tell me when and where and if I need to do anything in particular.”
She gives me the address and time and says she’ll call the school and put me on the list. This she says as if she’s thinking through a to-do list and not to me specifically.
“Do you want me to bring her to the shop? Or…” I trail off because I don’t know where she lives and don’t know that she wants me to know.
“The shop works. There’s free cake in it for you.”
“You don’t have to do that, sweetheart. I’d do it for you and for Clara either way. Not that I’d turn it down, mind you,” I continue as she keeps her muttered to-do list going, missing my little joke. “See you in a bit.”
“Okay. And thank you, Father.”
ThisFathershit has got to stop.
Or I’ve got to stop caring.
After grabbing my cell and telling Evelyn that I am leaving early, I quickly head home, switch out of my blacks into jeans and a tee. I grab a ball cap on my way back to the car and take off for Clara’s school.
She is waiting for me outside with her teacher, who insists on ID, when I come strolling up to the office. Never having done this before, it’s both secure in a random way and completely insecure in all the ways that matter. Clara proceeds to tell her teacher, whose name I can’t remember, all about how I like pretty flowers and the color pink and that I share cupcakes with her. I’m sure there’s more in there, but since she doesn’t take a breath, it’s hard to know. Eventually, amid the run-on sentences and breathless one-sided conversation, she tells her teacher goodbye and turns and grabs my hand. She tugs me toward the street and only then does she realize she doesn’t know what I drive or where we’re going next. “Where’s your car, Poppa Sean?”
If my cold, dead heart could burst, it would be in a million pieces on the sidewalk outside Fleur de Lis Preschool in New Orleans. It takes a second of her tugging to realize I’m just staring, rooted in place, irreparably falling for this little girl’s charms.
This kid cracks me up. I put her in the back seat, only after she tells me her mom says she’s too little for the front seat. Of course, Clara disagrees. Stringently.
She has big ideas, which she tells me about as we take the long way back to Petites Fleurs. She tells me what she’s learning in school, the drama of her day, a story about unicorns and flying mermaids, and how her socks feel in her shoes. She likes school lunches. And she likes pink. A lot.
“Poppa Sean, do you like pink?
“Yes, but my favorite color is blue or maybe black.”
“Nobody’s favorite color is black, silly.”
“You think I’m silly, pretty girl?”
“Sometimes I do. Your car has lots of buttons.”
That doesn’t require a comment so I stay silent. Clara, on the other hand, continues her side of the conversation, only occasionally leaving room for feedback.
As we near the shop and I can see the bakery in the distance, Clara begins again, “Poppa Sean, are you momma’s friend?”
“Yes, sweetheart.”
“Like the kind who nap at Petty Floors?”
“What?” I ask, wondering if we’re back to fairy tales and unicorns.
“Hey! It’s Mommy! Roll down my window, please, Poppa Sean?” I oblige just in time to allow her squeal to fly out the car. “Hey, Mommy!! I’m in Poppa Sean’s car and he called me pretty!!” she yells as she waves.
Sirona makes good on her bribe for me. After I share a cupcake with Clara—at her insistence—and by share, I mean she ate all the peanut butter frosting and left me the stump, I leave with a gray and turquoise box filled with lemon squares, petits fours, and oatmeal chocolate chip cookies.
* * *
Bobby callsafter I get home with the news that I’m officially a homeowner. It’s a house I’ve never seen before, a three story, brick row house in Charleston. The pictures are amazing and I hope one day I get to see it.