Chapter 34

I showed the invitation to my girls that night at the dinner table. They were torn between being impressed, jealous that they couldn't come along, and worried that I might soon be out of a job.

"I don't know why you guys are worried. The job's mine for as long as I want it." I said, speared a slice of mutton with my fork and lifted it to my lips.

"Didn't you tell me it was a Presidential Directive that created your department in the first place?" Izzy asked.

"Mmm-hmmm." I mumbled around the food in my mouth.

"Well, what if this President decides to issue a directive that cancels the first one? He can do that, right?"

I nodded and swallowed. "Yeah, he could."

Lilly flashed me a brief, knowing smile before returning her attention to AJ, who was having a little trouble cutting his lamb chop.

Izzy frowned, having caught our silent exchange. "So what's to stop him?"

I grinned wolfishly.

"You wouldn't!" she exclaimed.

Peggy snorted. "Of course he would. He gave the last President a woody." she said with a trace of displeasure in her tone.

"What's a woody?" Tink asked eagerly, showing interest in our conversation for the first time all evening. Lilly shushed her quietly.

"You disapprove, half-pint?" I asked before taking a sip of coffee.

Peggy dropped her fork onto her plate and leaned forward, putting her elbows on the table.

"How many people have you put rings into this month Ike? How many since February? Two, three hundred?"

I frowned, set my cup down carefully and did a quick mental head count.

"Six hundred and fifty seven." I replied blandly.

"Six hundred and fifty seven." she parroted. "And what have you accomplished? What are you trying to do Ike? I thought you didn't want to be king."

I stared at her for a few moments then looked over at my sister, who was staring right back at me.

"Is that what you think this is all about?" I looked from Izzy to Peggy and finally to Lilly. "All of you?"

"I know!" Tink exclaimed, her voice tinged with sadness.

Rosie, who was sitting next to Tink, gave her smaller sister's shoulder a shove. "Shut up." she hissed.

"Tink, no!" Belle demanded insistently from her position on the opposite side of the table.

AJ lifted his face from the plate in front of him, where he'd been busy shoveling rice into his mouth, and gave Tink a food flecked smile of encouragement.

"What do you know honey?" Peggy inquired, still glaring at me.

Tink hesitated for a few seconds, looking around at all the eyes that were focused on her. "I know what Daddy's doing."

"Daddy doesn't even know what he's doing." Izzy grumped huffily.

"He does too!" Tink insisted. "He's protecting us. Daddy doesn't want to lose us like his real family." Her final words faded with a terrible, lingering sensation of despair behind them.

There wasn't a sound to be heard. Utter and absolute silence embraced the dining room with a cast iron choke hold.

It wasn't easy, making sense of what I'd heard. I played Tink's words over and over again in my mind.

'Real family' rang in my ears like a great brass bell whose vibrations relentlessly pounded behind my eyes before ripping their way down thru my heart.

Instinctively I rejected what she'd said out of hand. No seven year old girl, not even my own daughter, had sufficient insight or life experience to accurately deconstruct my motives or emotions.

Sure, she was smart. And there was no escaping that she was inordinately perceptive, but even so...

I had to admit, at least to myself, that in one respect she was dead on. I was trying to protect them. I desperately wanted to protect them. Needed to protect them. Even though I knew in my heart that there was no way I could. And probably shouldn't.

What bothered me most was that Tink believed I thought less of them than the family I'd lost.

My baby girl was perceptive, no doubt about it. Perceptive, but wrong.

I pushed my chair back from the table and stood up slowly. Their eyes followed my ascent, but I kept mine on Tink's face. The dull ache in my chest and stomach were growing all out of proportion. I'd lived with pain and suffering on a scale no one could imagine, lived with death as my only companion, my dearest friend and closest confidant. But Tink's words pained me in a way that those other feelings never had. And in the back of my mind I wondered how I'd let it happen.

I stared into my daughter's eyes and smiled sadly.

"All of you here are my real family." I told her. I turned around, went out into the kitchen, wrenched open the door to the basement and headed down the stairs without turning on the lights.

Cool moist air greeted me at the bottom. I rummaged thru the tall wine racks that lined the near wall until I located the one I was after, one I'd stashed there almost two years before. A gift from a previous Russian ambassador. One hundred and twenty proof peppered vodka from Kiev.

I broke the sealing wax from around the neck, pulled the cork using the corkscrew that dangled from a hook on the end of the long series of racks, sat down on the cellar's parquet tiled floor and took a deep swig of the spicy, fiery dark alcohol.

What the hell was I trying to prove? More importantly, who was I trying to prove it to?

The only answer that made any sense was that I was trying to prove it to myself. Okay then, what?

That I could keep them, all of them, safe.

Why? History demonstrated rather plainly that I couldn't. I'd lost Carlie and our unborn child. Peggy'd had her arm broken, Izzy'd been drugged, abused and nearly died, Lilly'd been burnt just touching me and with a spectacular lack of self control I'd very nearly blown up a plane with the both of us inside.

The darkness had been right, all those years before. I couldn't protect anyone. Not from the world, and sure as hell not from me.

I put the mouth of the bottle up to my lips, tilted my head back and took a long series of membrane burning swallows.

I lowered the bottle and set it down between my crossed legs.

What was I going to do?

What was I supposed to do?

"Damned if I know." I muttered into the dark cellar.

I felt a small bundle of distress moving closer. I sat up slightly and cocked the right side of my head towards the door at the top of the stairs, waiting and listening.

Click!

The door opened very slowly, spilling bright white light a third of the way down the left side of the stairs.

"Daddy?" a plaintive little voice called down. "Are you down there Daddy?"

I lowered my head and looked into the neck of the bottle between my legs.

"Yes honey." I said, raising my voice.

The door opened a bit wider and the sound of light, cautious footsteps echoed faintly off the walls and ceiling.

"I can't see you." she called out, a little too loudly. She was scared, frightened and worried. I looked over to where the stairs met the floor and saw that she'd stopped about two thirds of the way down. I could just make out the embroidered flowers that decorated the bib of her green overalls.

I palmed the bottle in one hand, noticed that there was only about two fingers worth of liquid remaining, and got to my feet. Three steps and I stood at the foot of the staircase.

"I'm right here in front of you." I said softly so as not to frighten her more than she already was.

"Are you mad at me?" She smiled hopefully, fearfully, hesitantly.

"No honey, I'm not mad."

"Mommy said I hurt your feelings."

Nosey little mommy.

"It's okay Tink, I'll live."

"I didn't mean to." she said earnestly.

"Did mommy tell you to say that?"

She dug the toe of one pink sneaker into the step she was standing on and looked at the brick wall on her left.

"Tink?"

She mumbled something indistinct and kept looking at the wall.

"Did you mean what you said?"

Her toe dug harder into the step and after a moment nodded her head.

"Can you tell me why?"

"I-dunno." she said, slurring it all into one quickly expelled breath.

I sighed loudly, stepped forward, scooped her up with my free arm, pulling her tiny body against my chest and moved back into the dark.

I corkscrewed down to the floor, finishing up in a cross legged position, with Tink sitting on my left thigh. I set the mostly empty bottle in my right hand down next to my right knee.

"I was twelve years older than you are now when I got married. We met when I went to college the first time."

"Was she pretty?" Tink asked, a little fearfully.

"Very pretty. Beautiful short auburn hair, pale freckled skin, hazel eyes that changed colors depending on the light ... her name was Carlie. She was a little shorter than your Aunt Lilly, but she was built kinda like your mom. Very compact and bursting at the seams with life."

"You loved her a lot, didn't you?"

"Oh yeah." I said, exhaling softly. "I still do. I'll always love her. She's as much a part of me as your mom is. As you are. Tink, when you really love a person, it doesn't matter that they're not around anymore; you never stop loving them. But just because Carlie and our baby were my first family, that doesn't mean that you're not my real family. They were my real family then. You guys are my real family now."

"What about your mommy and daddy? Weren't they your real family?" she asked.

I rolled my eyes in the direction of the darkest corner of the cellar.

"Remember the story I told you in the hospital?"

"About Fred? I remember."

"Well ... this is kinda complicated. I loved my mother as much as you love yours, and she loved me, but your Grandpa, he didn't like me a whole lot."

"Because of the way you look?"

I peered down at her wide, trusting, insightful eyes. "Yeah. My brother and sister didn't like me either. So I never really felt like I was part of the family."

I shook my head sadly at the memories that returned unbidden to the movie screen of my mind. "No, they weren't my real family; not the kind I wanted anyway. Carlie was my first real family. But that family was taken away from me and I didn't think I'd ever find anything like it ever again ... until I met your Aunt Lilly and your mom."

"And Aunt Izzy." Tink reminded me primly.

"Izzy too." I said with a grin.

"How come you and mommy aren't married?"

Damn!

"You know what the law is, right?"

Tink nodded. "Sure. The law is a bunch of rules. Like no spitting on the sidewalk and keeping off the grass and speed limits and stuff."

I smiled and gave her a little hug.

"Right. But there's a whole bunch of laws that you don't know about yet. Some are really old and some are new, some make sense and some don't. Some are so complicated and confusing that no one really understands what they mean, so lots of really smart people argue for years and years trying to figure them out. But there's a law that says if I'm married to more than one woman at the same time I'll go to prison. Besides, it wouldn't be fair if I was only married to your mom and not Lilly and Izzy. How do you think that would make them feel?"

"Sad."

"Yeah. But your mom and Aunt Izzy and Lilly and me, we wanted to be together; to be a family. So we did the only thing we could; we decided to stay together in one house and just act as if we were really married to each other. I think of them as my wives and they think of me as their husband. And we all love each other very much."

"And then you had us!" she giggled.

I chuckled deep down in my throat, lowered my head and kissed her on the forehead. Tink giggled louder, shivering ever so slightly.

"If you aren't married then how can you be my real daddy?"

My heart lurched within my chest. One tiny little slip of girl, armed with an apparently bottomless supply of questions, had me feeling more defensive and unprepared than all the armed men and women I'd ever faced.

"Well, let's see ... first off, your mom and I made you, so that should count for something. But just about anyone can make a baby. My name isn't on your birth certificate, not yours or your sister's or brother's, because of the law, but that doesn't mean I'm not your real daddy either. It takes a lot more than that to be a real daddy."

"Like what?"

"Like being there when you cried, walking back and forth all night with you in my arms when you couldn't sleep, changing your diapers, giving you baths, playing games with you, teaching you to talk, being there when you took your first steps, picking you up when you fell down and encouraging you to keep trying ... things like that. But most important of all, I think, is letting you know how much you are loved and wanted. You'll never have to be afraid that I don't love you Tink. Not now, not ever."

Tink gave me a tearful smile and a warm hug.

"Why don't you turn on the light Daddy?" she said, changing the subject abruptly.

"I like the dark. It's quiet and peaceful..."

"And dark." she said pointedly.

I couldn't help but laugh. "Yeah ... dark too. But I see pretty good in the dark, so it doesn't bother me like it does most people. You're not scared of the dark, are you?"

She pulled her chin down and leaned into me. "Not all the time."

I've always been fascinated by the similarities between my girls and their daughters; Peggy and Tink in particular. They're so much alike in appearance, facial expressions and mannerisms. And one of the most intriguing of those mannerisms is the way they both work so hard at appearing grown up and sophisticated in front of other people, yet drop into what I've come to think of as 'little girl' mode when they're alone with me.

I know why they do it. They're manipulating me. Peggy, because of her empathic ability, knows that I automatically become more protective and emotionally receptive when she does it. I was never quite sure though why, or how, Tink had adopted her mother's behavior. Maybe it was genetic, like the toe bouncing they both did when very excited.

"If you want, I'll turn the light on." I offered.

She snuggled back against my chest and shook her head. "That's okay."

We sat together in the dark for a few long seconds. I lifted the bottle to my lips once again and poured the remaining vodka down my throat.

Lowering the clear glass container, I peered at it for a moment in disbelief. I'd put away nearly a liter of one twenty proof alcohol in less than twenty minutes and didn't have so much as a decent buzz to show for it.

I did a quick scan of my body. The vodka was being absorbed at a phenomenal rate thru the lining of my stomach wall, and most of it was already in my blood stream. So why didn't I feel any of the usual effects?

"Daddy?"

"Hmmm?"

"What's that?"

"Well, it was a bottle of vodka. Now it's just an empty bottle."

"Does it taste good?"

"I like it."

Tink considered that for a bit. "It smells funny."

I smiled into the darkness. "I suppose it does."

"Can I try some?" she asked sweetly.

"Little girls shouldn't drink vodka."

"Does mommy like vodka?"

"Not this kind."

"But she drinks the regular kind, right? And she's little."

"Yes, she sometimes drinks vodka. But your mommy's not little, she's just small. It's not the same thing."

"Please daddy?" she wheedled, shifting her shoulders and back against my chest with a gentle rocking motion that was powerfully reminiscent of the way her mother moved her hips when she wanted something from me.

I sighed softly in resignation. "I'll have to get another bottle."

The feel of her smile tickled the back of my brain. I lifted her up off my thigh and set her on her feet beside me, got up and went in search of another bottle. There'd been only the one good bottle of peppered vodka, which was at that moment laying dry and discarded on the floor, so I had to settle for one of a batch that I'd made myself.

When I say I made it, what I mean is that I purchased a half gallon jug of passable vodka and mixed in crushed peppercorns. Then I'd let it sit in the cellar for two months before dividing it up into individual bottles. What I ended up with was nowhere within spitting distance of the real thing, but it'd do in a pinch.

I rationalized to myself that, if I were lucky, the harsh taste might well put Tink off drinking liquor for years to come, so a minor violation of the Good Daddy Code was, in the end, all in a good cause.

I popped the self installed cork and returned to where Tink stood fidgeting, doing her best to appear brave and unconcerned. I twisted back down to the floor, set the new bottle next to the empty near my right knee, put my hands around Tink's waist and sat her back down on my left thigh. She quickly pressed back against me, whimpering softly like a puppy. I put my left arm across her body and held her close.

"Miss me?" I asked with a smile she couldn't see.

"No!" she replied with a pouty little face. Then, softly, almost defiantly, "I wasn't scared."

"There's nothing wrong with being scared Tink. Everyone's afraid sometimes."

"Not you. Mommy says you're not afraid of anything."

"Oh, sweetie ... I wish that were true." I picked up the fresh bottle, pursed my lips and took a long swig. Then I lowered the bottle down and brushed it lightly against Tink's hands.

"Just a little taste, kiddo." Tink reached out and clasped it eagerly with both hands, sniffed the neck and then put it to her mouth, tilted her head back.

She shuddered violently, scrunched up her face and opened her mouth wide, gasping for air.

"Aaackkk! Ewww ... tastes like medicine." she complained, spilling a little of the dark liquid across her chin. I took the bottle from her and set it back down on the floor. Then, with my right index finger, I wiped her lower lip and chin clean.

"So, what do you think? Pretty good, huh?"

"Nasty!" she said, sticking her tongue out and licking her lips.

I chuckled softly and hugged her. Tink giggled and clasped my left arm with both of hers.

"What are you afraid of daddy?" she asked unexpectedly.

I sighed loudly. "Like you said at supper ... I'm afraid of losing my family. I'm afraid of how much it would hurt."