Daddy in Dress Blues

by Cathie Linz

  “Yes, I saw. I also saw you coaching her.”

  “There some law against that?”

  “No.” Looking down at his clipboard, she added, “Providing you’re not expecting her to do too much.”

  “You set low goals and you never reach the heights.”

  As he went to rejoin his daughter, Jessica remembered the heights she’d reached with Curt in the back of his Mustang.

  Her goals had been very lofty at the time. She’d wanted him to love her. She’d wanted him to take her away and give her happiness. She’d wanted to give him children.

  But another woman had done that for him. Had he loved Blue’s mother? He’d shown no signs of grieving, but then he always kept his emotions under a tight lid. She’d heard remorse in his voice when he spoke of Gloria, but nothing else.

  How pitiful are you? her inner voice scoffed. Here you are scrambling after crumbs that Curt hadn’t loved Gloria even if she’d borne his child. He should have loved her. Blue deserved two parents who loved her. Every child did.

  But Jessica knew all too well that the reality was quite different. The important thing was having someone who loved you.

  Could Curt be that someone for Blue, be what she needed in a parent?

  He was showing signs of improvement, of being more open than he had been in the beginning. And there was no mistaking the pride on his face when he’d watched Blue go through her tumbling routine. He was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, yet he still managed to stand out from the other dads. And she couldn’t blame it on the U.S. Marine Corps T-shirt he was wearing, despite the fact that it fit him to perfection and drew attention to his broad shoulders and muscular arms.

  No, it wasn’t the uniform. It had never been the uniform. It was Curt.

  He was getting to her. Bit by bit.

  “Thanks for coming with us for an early dinner,” Curt said as he held the door to Dino’s open for Jessica.

  Since leaving the kindergym session at the nearby community center, Blue had insisted on holding on to Jessica’s hand as well as her father’s. So Jessica found herself tethered to Curt, with a child providing the link. It was hard not to be affected by the metaphor here. Or not to be affected by the man and his child.

  In the three weeks since he’d walked into her preschool classroom, he’d changed in some ways and remained stubbornly the same in others. He was still a study of contrasts. The rigidity of his cropped dark hair remained at war with the sensual fullness of his mouth and the heated intensity of his brown eyes. He’d still had the ability to consume her with a single glance. That much hadn’t changed.

  But there were differences. The recent scar that formed a ragged line along his jaw was beginning to heal. He seemed more at ease with her and with Blue.

  And Blue had changed as well. No longer was she the frightened little girl, her brown hair tied up into two lopsided pigtails, who’d stood nervously beside Curt, close enough to touch him but not doing so. The beat-up lime-green thin jacket she’d worn that day had since been replaced with a cheerful yellow rain slicker that kept today’s rainy weather at bay.

  Pausing near the open door, Blue pointed up before telling Jessica and Curt, “The sky is crying. My mommy lives there in the sky. In heaven. Is she crying, too?”

  Chapter 7

  CURT GAVE JESSICA a bewildered look that let her know he was still uncertain about how to deal with the subject of Gloria’s death. That he revealed even that much was a big step. Not long ago he would have responded with a steely-eyed expression that rejected any emotion. Yes, he was coming around, slowly but surely.

  Then Blue went on to ask, “Can you somersault when you get dead?”

  Now Curt’s expression was tinged with panic. Since Curt was so uncomfortable with the subject during Daddy Boot Camp, Jessica had only had time to caution him not to tell Blue that death was like sleeping, because that would make the little girl afraid to fall asleep. She hadn’t gone on to tell him what to say. But at the moment he looked incapable of speaking at all.

  “If you’re in heaven, I don’t see why you couldn’t do somersaults there,” Jessica replied, smoothing back Blue’s damp hair from her face.

  “Will Tawanna get dead?” Blue said.

  Squeezing the little girl’s hand, Jessica replied, “Not for a long time, hopefully.”

  Turning away from Jessica, Blue intently stared up at her father. “Will you get dead, Daddy?”

  Curt stood there, frozen, unable to use the old line that marines never die, they just go to hell and regroup.

  “Everybody dies sometime,” he said, his voice sounding rusty even to his own ears. Clearing his throat, he added, “But I plan on being around for a very long time. Until you’re at least as old as I am.”

  “Everybody dies?” Blue repeated, her eyes going as big as saucers. “Even the Easter Bunny?”

  “Uh, well, I’m no expert on the Easter Bunny,” Curt replied, backpedaling. “Jessie knows more about that stuff than I do.”

  “You folks need a booster seat?” Emily, a longtime waitress, interrupted them to ask. Bending down to Blue, she said, “Well, hi there, sweet pea.”

  Emily had been working at Dino’s for as long as Jessica could remember. She usually only worked the weekday afternoon shift, so Jessica didn’t get to see her that often anymore. The sixty-something waitress was known for her outgoing personality and flamboyant earrings. Today the earrings were dangling red cherries that bobbed around her face as she spoke to Blue. “Aren’t you just the cutest thing.”

  “No,” Blue said. “G.I. Joe is cuter than me.”

  To give him credit, Curt didn’t immediately correct her by saying that the military action figure wasn’t cute. Instead he firmly stated, “No one is cuter than my daughter.”

  Blue beamed. Just beamed.

  Jessica wanted to reach out and hug Curt. She wished she had the words to tell him how important this moment was, how much a little girl needed her father’s love and approval.

  Not having received either from her own father, Jessica knew firsthand how you could spend a lifetime longing for something you never had. First it had been her father’s love, then it had been Curt’s love, and then it had been a child’s love. And while the children in her classes loved her while they were with her, they moved on. The way Curt had moved on. Another group of children came in at the preschool, and the process began again. But none of the children were hers.

  Other men had come into her life. But none of them were the love of her life. None of them were meant to be hers.

  Standing there looking at Curt, she wondered how her life and his would have been different if he had loved her the way she’d loved him all those years ago.

  Jessica knew there was no point in living in the past. She also knew that new beginnings were as tenuous as a seedling first breaking through the soil, easily crushed by forces outside its own control. But with enough sunshine and water it could grow into something as sturdy as an oak tree.

  She had no idea if what she had with Curt was something that could grow beyond the seedling stage. But she was curious enough to stay for now and find out.

  “I can’t believe this place is still here,” Curt said as he helped Blue into the plastic booster seat Emily had placed at a table near the front window. “Do they still serve great cheeseburgers and curly fries?”

  “Yes, they do.” Jessica reached for the chair across from him, but before she could pull it out he was there to do it for her. “Thanks.” After sitting down, she could feel his warm breath on her nape as he leaned closer to gently scoot the chair in. A little courtesy that made her senses hum.

  “I used to imagine I was eating one of those burgers instead of an MRE,” he admitted, before returning to his side of the table.

  “A what?”

  “Meal ready to eat.”

  She wrinkled her nose. “Doesn’t sound very appetizing.”

  “The beef frankfurters and beans aren’t bad when you’re out in t
he field. But then you don’t join the marines for the food.”

  “Why did you join?” She’d been wanting to ask him that question for some time.

  “To see the world.”

  She had the feeling he wasn’t telling her the entire story but she didn’t challenge his answer. “And have you done that?”

  “Before 9/11 I participated in several joint service and training operations in Japan, South Korea and the Philippines. Since 9/11 I’ve been in the war zone, Iraqi mostly.”

  “Is that where you were wounded?”

  “I was wounded in my right thigh,” he dryly replied.

  Just thinking about his thighs made Jessica blush. Reaching for her iced water, she gulped the cold liquid and prayed he wouldn’t notice her bright red cheeks.

  Little chance of that. But to her relief, he made no comment. Unfortunately Blue did.

  “Jessie’s face is red.”

  “Because I’m hot. It’s warm in here.” She tugged on the open collar of her pink blouse. “Don’t you think so?”

  Curt thought she should continue whatever she was doing with her shirt because it allowed him to get brief glimpses of her shadowy cleavage. Now he was the one getting hot.

  “I was a drill sergeant. A group of kids from different parts of the country—some rich, most not, some educated, some not—train together. When you head out on an operation and leave the U.S., you realize that this is for real and that you can’t screw up. Your biggest fear is of making a mistake and causing another marine to get hurt. Those guys are my family.”

  “Blue is your family now,” she reminded him.

  “I know that.”

  Did he? His voice had been so filled with emotion when he talked about the marines. It was obvious he loved the life.

  She also wondered if his biggest parenting fear was making a mistake and causing his daughter to get hurt. Asking him outright wouldn’t get her anywhere. She’d have to finagle the answer out of him.

  “That must be a great deal of pressure and responsibility, feeling that you have to be perfect or someone could get hurt.”

  He shrugged. “Crisis situations are opportunities for someone to get hurt. You just work to make sure it’s not anyone in your command.”

  “Or yourself,” she added. “Unless you’re saying that you’d put your troops’ welfare above your own?”

  “Marines aren’t troops.” He sounded insulted. “We’re marines. With a capital M.”

  “Fine.” The man was as prickly as a hedgehog. Not that a marine would approve of being likened to a hedgehog. He’d have to be as prickly as a…a hand grenade. “But you haven’t answered my question.”

  “As their commanding officer it’s my job to make sure they get out safely, and in order to accomplish that job I have to stay alive.”

  He was tap-dancing around the question. She had to smile at that mental image. A marine tap-dancing. Another no-no. “And if someone makes a mistake?”

  “To err may be human and to forgive divine.” He gave her a solemn look belied by the gleam in his brown eyes. “However, neither is Marine Corps policy.”

  “Which is why Marine Corps policy can’t be applied to parenthood,” she replied.

  “I don’t see why it couldn’t be adapted for parenthood.”

  “Because you’re bound to make mistakes and the best you can hope for is to learn from them.”

  He nodded and said, “Like stickers.”

  She blinked at him in confusion. “Excuse me?”

  “I learned not to give stickers to short-stuff here.” He tilted his head in Blue’s direction, who was coloring with the crayons and paper Emily had given her. “Because she has a tendency to put them all over my stuff. She even stuck them on the soles of my shoes. But she knows not to do that anymore.”

  “Look, Daddy, look! Look what I made!” She waved her picture at him, almost knocking over his glass of water in the process.

  “Careful there, short-stuff,” he said, but his voice lacked the drill sergeant bite it had had when he’d first gotten custody of Blue. “Let’s see what you’ve got here.” He bent his head close to his daughter to get a good look at her drawing.

  “Me,” Blue said, pointing to the smaller of the blobs. “Daddy and Jessie.”

  “We make a nice couple,” Curt told Jessica as he held up the drawing for her approval. They looked like a couple of bowling balls with feet to him. But hey, he was no art critic. And if his kid drew it, then it was the best drawing this side of the Chicago Art Institute.

  “You folks ready to order?” Emily asked.

  “Maybe I should cut back on the fries.” Curt nodded at the drawing he still held before patting his flat stomach.

  “I don’t think you have anything to worry about,” Jessica dryly assured him. She, on the other hand, had plenty to worry about. Not in the tummy department. But in the “Curt” department.

  After ordering, Curt let Blue tell him the story of what she was drawing now, which had something to do with the Easter Bunny and G.I. Joe. Jessica was content to sit back and watch them. It gave her pleasure to see how well Curt was interacting with Blue.

  Okay, so it gave her pleasure just looking at Curt, period. But it also made her feel good to see that he was making great strides in his parenting skills. Of course he couldn’t resist giving Blue one or two instructions on how to improve her drawing, his version of a “color within the lines” speech. But when Blue ignored him, he let her do her own thing.

  Once the food arrived, talking was abandoned in favor of taking mouthwatering bites of cheeseburger topped with fresh tomatoes and lettuce. Blue got a hot dog from the kiddy menu.

  “Mmm,” Curt mumbled.

  “No talking with mouth full,” Blue reprimanded him, patting his arm as a reminder.

  “Mmm” was all Curt said, his eyes still closed in ecstasy.

  Blue reached over to snitch one of his French fries, only to cry out as she bit into the too hot center.

  “Ow!” Her big brown eyes swam with tears that rapidly ran down her face.

  Curt’s eyes snapped open to stare at his daughter with concern. “What happened?”

  “Here, Blue, sip some cold water,” Jessica said, holding the glass to Blue’s lips while smoothing the hair back from her face with a loving hand. She then answered Curt’s question. “She took one of your fries and burned her mouth.” Returning her attention to Blue, she said, “It’s okay, sweetie. You’ll be okay.”

  Curt watched in amazement and relief as his daughter’s tears quickly evaporated. He’d closed his eyes just for a second and Blue had hurt herself. He felt that wave of guilt, just as he had that first week when Blue had gone to bed with her shoes still on. What made him think he’d ever master this parenting stuff? Just when he thought he was making progress, something happened to set him back on his butt and teach him yet again that he wasn’t father material.

  A marine never gives up. So he had setbacks. They were bound to occur. He had to learn from them and move on.

  One thing he’d learned was how good Jessica was with Blue.

  “You’re good with kids,” he noted quietly.

  She shrugged off his words. “It’s my job.”

  “It’s more than a job,” Curt said in the voice of one who knew what it was like to have a calling rather than just filling time with a job.

  Their eyes met. No words were spoken but something special was shared. The visual exchange had a disturbing effect on her metabolism, making her heart beat faster, making her want…him. The noisy restaurant seemed to fade into the background and time stood still, as she simply gazed into the heated intensity of his brown eyes.

  The sound of Blue’s fork clattering on the floor shattered the moment. Blinking, Jessica pulled herself away from the powerful bond forged between herself and Curt by nothing more than a mere look. Ah, but what a look it had been!

  Automatically reaching down to pick up the cutlery, Jessica smiled at Blue, who was tuggin
g on her tongue and trying to look down at it at the same time. “Does your mouth still hurt, sweetie?”

  Blue nodded. She stopped her tongue-tugging when Curt suggested ordering some ice cream. Pointing at a picture on the kid’s activity place mat, she said, “How come kitties purr and we don’t?”

  “Because we’re not kitties,” Jessica replied.

  Blue nodded again, as if satisfied with that answer, before suddenly leaning over to rest her head on Jessica’s shoulder. “I love you,” she said, gazing up at her with a smile that was pure gold.

  It wasn’t the first time one of her preschoolers had told her that. She’d loved them all back while managing to keep a certain emotional distance. Because the kids moved on. She’d trained herself to accept this, to enjoy them while they were with her and put them out of her mind when they weren’t. Sometimes that was harder to do than others. But never had it become as impossible as it was with Blue.

  And it wasn’t merely because the little girl was Curt’s daughter. It wasn’t simply because the little girl had so tragically lost her own mother. No, it was just Blue.

  “I love you, too,” Jessica whispered, running her fingers through Blue’s baby-fine hair.

  The moment the ice cream arrived, Blue straightened and focused all her attention on the dessert. Jessica didn’t find it that easy to dismiss her own turbulent emotions.

  After spurning her attempts to pay for her own meal and insisting on paying the entire bill himself, Curt bundled the now tired-looking Blue back into her yellow rain slicker with military efficiency. The fact that the little one didn’t protest was a clear indication that she was sleepy.

  Once they were all outside the restaurant, Curt offered to walk Jessica home.

  “No, that’s okay,” Jessica quickly replied. “I only live a few blocks away. And Blue is ready to fall asleep.” Looking closer, she said, “I think she already has fallen asleep.” The sight of the little girl’s cheek resting against Curt’s shoulder made Jessica’s heart melt.

  Oh, yeah, Curt and his daughter were getting to her, all right. Big time.

  It was too late to protect herself. Too late to tell herself she should have kept her distance. All she could do now was pray that she’d be strong enough to say goodbye when the time came for Curt and Blue to move on.