by Whitley Cox
She could do this.
It was only an hour.
An hour to smile, help someone else, allow her career and a sweet little girl to distract her. Then she could go back to her empty apartment, change into her pajamas and cry until she was empty. Well, emptier than she already felt.
But for now, she needed to stow all that and help little Aria.
A knock at the open door had her inhaling deep, throwing on an even bigger smile and turning to face her new client.
“Hi, I’m Tessa.”
3
Aria hid behind Atlas’s legs. She reached up and clutched at his belt, practically pulling down his pants as she resisted going inside the therapist’s office.
Though he wouldn’t call it an office at all. It was more like an art studio slash theater dressing room on steroids.
There was a pottery wheel in one corner, several easels along the window, paint bottles housed neatly on a four-foot shelf next to several coffee cans of paintbrushes. Then along the other wall there was what looked like a puppet theater, a rack of dress-up clothes and even a small stage.
Paper of all shade and manner took up a high shelf close to a desk, and there were probably close to a million colored pencils, felt pens, crayons and pastels all tidily organized and labeled in various clear plastic drawers.
“Come on, honey,” Atlas urged, grabbing a whimpering Aria by the wrist and dragging her out from behind him. Cecily was in the bucket car seat in his other arm, thankfully fast asleep. Though it’d been a fucking scream-a-thon in the car on their twenty-minute drive here until she finally passed out.
All of a sudden, the kid hated her car seat.
Fuck his life.
No break could be caught.
Seriously, none.
“No!” Aria protested, managing to both yell and growl at the same time. She scrambled back behind him and tugged harder on his belt, attempting to pull him back out into the hallway. “I don’t wanna!”
He hadn’t even had a chance to look at the therapist, he’d been so consumed with his child and hoping to God she didn’t wake up the finally sleeping baby.
Jenny guessed Cecily was teething, which meant she would be miserable for the foreseeable future.
Fucking great.
“Come on, sweetie,” he cooed gently. “The nice lady has felt pens and lots of paper. You love art.” If he let go of her, she’d probably take off down the hallway, so he set the car seat down on the ground and whipped around, grabbing Aria’s other wrist and hauling her into the office.
She started to scream.
And it was a fucking ear-piercing, glass-shattering shriek. Dogs within a five-mile radius were probably running for cover, burying their heads beneath a pillow or whimpering because they thought their brains were going to explode.
Then the crying started.
Not Aria’s, because she was still screaming.
Cecily.
Of course. Because Aria had woken her up with her banshee wail.
Atlas’s blood began to bubble, and heat flooded his limbs and face.
A flurry of light blue or whatever the fuck color it was swooshed past the corner of his eye as he hunkered down to a squat and grabbed his frustrated daughter by the shoulders.
“Hi,” came a soft, melodic female voice beside him. “I’m Tessa.” He barely heard her, even though she was right next to him, what for the screaming and crying that was louder than the Foo Fighters concert Samantha had dragged him to six years ago. “I can tell you’re really frustrated. You probably have a lot of feelings going on inside your body right now, and that is completely okay. You are allowed to be angry. You are allowed to be scared and nervous and sad. You can have as many and whatever feelings you want.”
Aria blinked a few times, and her screams ebbed into a whine.
Cecily was in full-on freak-out mode though.
Aria’s hazel eyes focused on Tessa. Atlas hadn’t even looked at the woman yet. But he did know she smelled really good. Like vanilla and something else.
“You know what?” Tessa continued, her voice low and calm. “You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do. If you don’t want to draw or paint or even move from where you’re standing now, you don’t have to. You don’t have to talk to me if you don’t want to. It’s up to you. You have all those choices.”
Aria’s blonde brows knitted together.
“I’m going to go over to that cool-looking triangle table over there and do some coloring. I have paper and felts and crayons all set up if you’d like to join me. You don’t have to. And if felts aren’t your thing, I also have paints. We can even finger-paint if you want.”
Light and interest flashed behind Aria’s eyes. Her breathing slowed down, and the mottled red of her complexion began to fade.
Tessa leaned forward a bit more and cupped her mouth with one hand, pretending to exclude Atlas from the conversation. “We can even take your socks off and you can paint with your toes if you want.”
Aria giggled. Her gaze flicked back up to Atlas, and her eyes turned wary again. “Daddy, where you going?”
Cecily’s screams had quieted down a bit, but the baby was still upset. He needed to get to her, but he also couldn’t abandon his daughter for the baby. That was the root of the problem right there. That was why they were at this “therapist” to begin with, because Aria felt abandoned by her father.
“I’ll be right outside, sweetheart. I’m just going to plop Cecily in the stroller and go for a walk around the block with her. She needs to nap.”
His daughter’s lip wobbled, and her eyes flicked back and forth between him, Tessa and the triangle table. She wasn’t sure what to do. She wanted to do all the fun things the therapist had mentioned, but she also didn’t want him to leave.
“I have an idea,” Tessa said, standing back up from where she was crouched next to him. He rose as well, and his eyes followed her across the room.
Of course she was dressed like a freaking hippie.
Long flowy skirt to the floor, bangles up both wrists that clacked together as she walked, and long golden mermaid hair down between her shoulder blades. That explained why the whole hallway and even more so the “office” smelled like a hippie commune. What was that? Patchouli?
His inner cynic rolled his eyes.
What next? When he came to pick his kid up, were they going to be in their own little drum circle? Tapping away on the bongos or some shit.
Despite the fact that Aria had calmed down, he was beginning to think this art therapist thing wasn’t such a good idea. He could give his kid crayons and paper at home for her to “channel” her frustrations, rather than indulge in the notion that “art” was therapy. Not that he didn’t have medical coverage through work; that wasn’t the issue. It was that he didn’t necessarily believe in this crap.
He’d gone to mandatory grief counseling after Samantha died—as was necessary before he could return to work—and it had done jack shit for him.
Maybe his therapist had been a hack or whatever, but either way, he’d only gone because he had to, only spoke when he had to, and as soon as his five sessions were up, he was out of there and back behind his desk at the office.
Work was his therapy. He was good at his job, and it was how he escaped the memories of Samantha. Home and Aria flooded him with nothing but reminders of his wife, but work—even though Samantha had been a lawyer too—she voluntarily gave up her career as a public defender to become a mother, so there were no memories of her at Atlas’s office. It made working easier. It made each day easier.
Aria was now quiet, and Cecily, by grace and by God, had quieted down too. Poor soul, she probably thought she was right back to being neglected. His gut twisted at the thought of Cecily quieting down because she just didn’t believe anybody cared.
He cared. He did. He just couldn’t let his daughter think he didn’t care about her either. He was being pulled in too many directions. He was only one man, one person, b
ut two very demanding little girls needed him, and there just wasn’t enough of him to go around.
Would there ever be?
The therapist turned around, and he nearly swallowed his fucking tongue.
She was gorgeous.
The intensity of her blue eyes smacked him hard in the solar plexus, the way her cheeks held just a touch of pink, and when her smile widened, it was like the roof had suddenly blown clear off the building and the sun was shining right in on all of them.
He cleared his throat and looked away for a moment.
He needed to get a grip.
What the fuck was going on? He should not be having these thoughts right now. He should not even be noticing attractive women, let alone his child’s “therapist.”
Slowly, he slid his gaze back to her and watched as she approached them again, a bunch of big wooden beads in a hippie craft-fair-looking woven basket, along with various colors of thin leather rope.
“Why don’t you make a couple of quick bracelets,” she suggested, motioning for Aria to follow her over to another table, this one a red circle with a bunch of child-size chairs around it. “Make one for you and one for Dad, and then while he’s gone, you both wear them. They are your connection bracelets. That way, even when you’re apart, you’re still connected. You can look at the bracelet and think of him, and he can look at the bracelet and think of you.”
Aria nodded and sat down at the table, diving into the assortment of rainbow-colored wooden beads.
This wasn’t going to really work, was it?
Connection bracelets?
He snatched the bottle of formula out of the diaper bag on his hip and handed it to a now quiet but fiercely fist-munching Cecily. The baby grabbed it with enthusiasm and began to guzzle in earnest. Hopefully that would knock her out and she’d be able to sleep for an hour on their walk. Maybe he could just push her for fifteen minutes, then sit on a park bench and get through some emails while she slept. Wouldn’t that be a novel idea? Rather than having to stay up until fucking midnight or later working because he’d been forced to leave work early to get Aria to this therapist.
“Okay, I’m done,” Aria announced, handing the first bracelet to Tessa. “Can you tie this around my wrist, please?”
“I’d be happy to,” Tessa replied.
“Thanks.”
Tessa went to task, tying the colorful bracelet around Atlas’s daughter’s tiny wrist. “You’re sure polite. Please and thank you.” She glanced up at Atlas. “Good job, Dad.”
He rolled his eyes, and his cheeks grew hot.
Yeah, he’d managed to drill please and thank you into his kid, but she was still a wailing siren when she didn’t get her way. He wasn’t sure one made up for the other.
“Okay, I’m done this bracelet, too,” Aria said, handing the bigger one to Tessa. “Can you tie it around my dad’s wrist, please?” Her hazel eyes grew eager and gleeful as she waited for Tessa to stand.
Rolling his eyes again, he held out his right hand, as his left sported his watch.
Her long fingers, with nicely trimmed nails, gently wrapped the purple, pink and yellow wooden beads around his wrist. Her movements were precise, but that didn’t stop her from brushing her fingers across his skin a couple of times as she secured the knot. Each touch sent a jolt through him. It was if he just kept sticking that fork in the electrical socket. Hadn’t learned his lesson the first time.
But he didn’t want to learn. Her touch was soft, gentle, and it made his gut flip and his chest tighten. That’s when he noticed the faint white tan line on her ring finger.
Hmmm.
He was mesmerized by her movements, by her fingers. What was probably close to twenty bangles between her two forearms jostled and clacked together as she moved. Wind chimes indoors. He noticed a small tattoo along the back of her wrist below her right pinky finger, but he couldn’t see it enough through the teak forest on her arms to make out what it was.
“Okay, all good,” she said, lifting her gaze to his and smiling infectiously before glancing down at Aria and grinning even wider. “Now you have your connection bracelets. So even though you’ll be apart, you’ll still be together. Connected.”
Aria beamed and stood up from the table. “Okay, bye, Dad. See you in a bit.” She ran over to where a row of smocks on hooks lined the walls. “Can I take my socks off and paint with my toes?” she hollered across the space.
Tessa returned her gaze to Atlas, her smile smaller now but no less beautiful. “You filled out the intake form online, so we’re good to go. The first few sessions or so are more just get-to-know-each-other sessions.”
Great, so his insurance was paying for his kid to have a glorified playdate with an adult. He fought another eye roll, grunted and nodded.
Tessa’s eyes shifted to the painted plate turned into a clock on the wall near her desk. “An hour work for you?”
An hour? Didn’t they have like thirty-five minutes left after that performance at the door and the snail’s-pace beading of his child?
“She’s my last client for the day,” she went on. “I usually reserve ninety minutes for the first couple of sessions with a new client, in case it’s a bit of a battle to get the kids inside. By the third or fourth session, they’re usually sprinting down the hallway to get here and telling their parents to scram.” She glanced over to where Aria was sitting on the floor, peeling off her socks. “She may not need a ninety-minute session next time.”
Atlas grunted again, grabbed Cecily’s car seat and murmured a thanks before he turned to go.
“Don’t forget to look at your connection bracelet,” Tessa called behind him, a chuckle to her tone.
He turned the corner and rolled his eyes again, but then they landed on the bracelet on his wrist, and warmth filled his chest as he thought of his daughter.
Ah, fuck. The hippie was right.
Exactly an hour later, there was another knock at the door, and in walked Aria’s father, Mr. Stark, with the baby now strapped to his chest in one of those adorable baby carriers.
Even though she was pretty sure she was swearing off men for the rest of her life, destined to be childless, dog-less and with no memory of anybody by the time she was fifty, her ovaries damn near exploded. Was there anything sexier than a man wearing a baby in one of those carrier things?
No.
She could confidently say there was not.
At least not to her.
A man who loved children, who was a doting and devoted father, was one of the most attractive guys out there. Which was weird in itself because that generally meant that that man was already taken.
She knew, though, from the intake form Aria’s father had filled out, that Aria’s mother had passed away recently, so chances are he was not taken.
But he probably wasn’t looking either.
Without saying anything, the father, Atlas, wandered up to where Tessa and Aria sat at the green triangle table gluing various dried pastas to a piece of orange construction paper. Aria was deep in concentration mode, her tongue sticking out and pinched between her teeth as she carefully placed the penne in a neat row.
“That’s the fence,” she said, straightening up, her smile full of pride. Her eyes shifted to where he stood behind them, and her face paled, her brows scrunched and her lips fell into a deep frown. “Noooo, Daddy. I’m not done yet. Nooooo. Go for another walk.”
Tessa smiled inwardly. That was an awesome sign. She’d already made great progress with Aria in their first hour, and the fact that the little girl was eager to stay longer meant it wouldn’t take long to dig deep and help her channel her frustrations. Help her manage and redirect her impulses to lash out at her father and the baby.
“It’s time to go,” Atlas said softly. “We need to get home for dinner. Jenny said she made us chicken parmigiana, your favorite.”
Jenny?
Aria stuck her tongue out and made a disgusted face. “I don’t like chicken parmi-gong-gah.”
> Atlas rolled his eyes. He did that a lot. “Yes, you do. Now let’s get going.”
Aria stood up and stomped her foot. “No!” Her fists bunched at her sides, and she glared up at her father, their difference in height not appearing to bother her at all. “I am staying!” She crossed her arms in front of her, and her frown turned into the mother of all scowls.
Tessa was forced to turn away and smile into her shoulder. She knew that this was a serious moment for Aria and her father, but that didn’t mean the little girl’s ire wasn’t also adorable.
Atlas’s nostrils flared, and the muscle in his jaw flexed. “Sweetheart,” he said through gritted teeth, “we need to get going.”
She could tell he was trying his damnedest to keep his emotions in check. It did nobody any good if, when the kid was losing their cool, the parent did too. Chaos greeted by more chaos did not beget calm.
He was a good dad, though. And the fact that he cared enough to see that his daughter needed help and sought out art therapy for her said a lot about what kind of a dad and man he was.
Her heart went out to Mr. Stark and his obvious struggles. He had a lot on his plate. It made her troubles with Carlyle, Forest and her mother seem small in comparison.
Aria uncrossed her arm and stomped her foot again, continuing to have a stare-down—or more like a glare-down—with her father. There was a lot of fearlessness in this little girl. He was raising a warrior. It would be tough in the beginning, having such a headstrong daughter to contend with, but she would grow up to be an incredible adult. He didn’t have to worry about Aria taking shit from anybody.
The only thing he needed to worry about was finding that balance of allowing her to be her fierce and headstrong self while still remaining the boss himself. He didn’t want to break her spirit. It was a delicate balance and one she saw so many parents struggle with.
She knew she should probably intervene, but this was also part of the therapy process. Observing how dad and daughter interacted, how he handled her obstinate behavior and how she reacted to his authority.
So far, Aria was a typical three-and-a-half-year-old girl. Stubborn, emotional and demanding.
