But then, one day, there she was again. A senior in college for art, of all things. The day I met Daisy in Lucille’s TA office, I was there to set her ass straight. We had a one-night stand a few months earlier. A little ‘let’s go out for drinks and catch up’ kind of date that went awry at the end. And she thought we were dating. Started leaving me crazy messages on my voicemail when I didn’t return her calls. And fine, I’m pretty used to crazy, that’s just the kind of women I end up with, but Lucille was going above and beyond.
I never did set her straight, though. Daisy appeared and my mind was wiped from that moment forward. I was caught in some kind of spell and didn’t snap out of it for days.
Here’s the part of the whole Daisy one-night stand that pissed me off. It wasn’t supposed to be a booty call. I had her number. After we had sex I handed her my phone and told her to call her number. She did. I know she did. I saw her do this. I looked at that number. I smiled about it.
Then we fell asleep and when I woke up, she was gone and that number was too.
Days, man. Days. I was sick over it. I can’t even explain why I was so sure this Daisy girl was gonna be a thing for me. But I was.
I am going to have a relationship with my child’s mother, whether I want one or not. And here’s the thing. I don’t think I like her. Not after how she left me.
I don’t care that most people probably think I have no right to be angry—I’m fucking pissed. She kept my daughter a secret for six years. I missed things. And fine, I’m no candidate for father of the year by any means, but she didn’t even give me a chance.
But here’s the real insult. People think that guys like me don’t have any feelings about the hookups, but that phone number thing? She erased our night together.
And then she did it again, didn’t she?
Thirty, or sixty, or ninety days later she knew she was pregnant with my child and she didn’t tell me.
And this just pisses me off.
At six-thirty AM I finally give up on sleeping and go downstairs. Gramps is already up drinking coffee and doing his wordsearch puzzles when I enter the kitchen.
He looks up at me and smiles. “I like your girl, Vicious. She’s a keeper.”
I nod at him and pour myself a cup of coffee. “Spencer said the same thing.” I sigh these words out like I’m already exhausted and the sun just came up.
“What’s her name again?”
“Vivian, Gramps.”
“Oh, yeah. You did good with that name, Vicious. Keep the V’s alive.”
This makes me smile. I didn’t really pay attention to that last night, but he’s right. Daisy named our daughter Vivian.
Why?
I didn’t introduce her to my brothers that one night we were together. So she looked us up.
This infuriates me. Because it means there was no way she didn’t know that Vivian was mine from the start.
She knew. All these missing years were premeditated on her part.
I just stand there in the kitchen and look down into my cup of coffee, wondering what I ever did to this girl that she would just toss me aside like that.
And I do get the irony. I have played many a girl in my player days. But what Daisy did feels like more. It feels personal. Like I wasn’t worth telling.
When she left my bedroom that night, she saw me the way everyone in this town sees me. As someone unworthy. Someone beneath her.
I thought about her for maybe… a week? Maybe even less. But that was a soul-searching week for me. I just didn’t understand why she would take her number back like that. She would’ve had to have been careful not to wake me. She would’ve had to use my fingerprint to open my phone. And then she would’ve had to search for her name.
I pictured her doing this. Sitting on my bed, the only light in the room coming from the phone in her hand making her face unnaturally bright. What else did she see in there?
Did she go through my photos?
Did she go through my numbers?
Did she check my browser history?
Who knows, who cares. None of those things are the point.
The point is… I was wrong about her.
She was nothing special.
And that’s when I forgot about her.
At seven-twenty I grab Vivian’s backpack that she left here yesterday, go outside and sit on the porch steps. I have a fresh cup of coffee for me and a juice box for Vivi, courtesy of Gramps.
I open the backpack up and take a look inside. She’s got the usual kid things in there. A stuffed animal, some hair ties, an extra t-shirt and pair of shorts, and that sketchbook.