* * *
The doorbell rang after dinner and Wes ducked inside, shaking snow off his hat.
“Wes!” Gus cried, spirit undampened.
“Hey, Gus. I heard you had a rough day so I brought someone to spend the night with you. She’s, uh, in the entryway.”
Wes winked at Gus and her eyes got wide.
“I’ll keep her in the box this time,” she whispered completely audibly.
Wes had texted Adam earlier to see if he could stand having Bettie in the house and Adam had told him he’d feel a lot better if he had Bettie and Wes. Wes had replied with a heart emoji.
As Gus ran for the entryway, Wes held up a bag to Adam.
“I also brought ice cream, for those less excited about Bettie.”
Adam smiled and Wes crossed to him and pulled him into his arms.
“You okay?” Wes asked. He stroked Adam’s hair.
“Yeah. Thanks.”
“What kind did you bring?” Gus asked, face bright. Bettie seemed to have revived her completely.
Wes put the bag on the table. “Check it out.”
Gus’ eyes got wider and wider as she pulled six different kinds of ice cream out of the bag.
“Wow,” she breathed worshipfully.
Adam shook his head but squeezed Wes’ hand.
“I wasn’t sure what you liked,” Wes said.
Gus seemed to be trying to hold all the containers at once.
“One bowl,” Adam said, perusing the selection himself.
Gus considered each flavor seriously and then said, “One bowl or one flavor?”
“Go to town, kid,” Adam said, and Gus did a little dance of excitement. She then proceeded to put some of every flavor in the bowl.
Adam helped himself to some mint chocolate chip. Wes took the salted caramel. They settled in the living room and Adam put the fire on.
“Oh, Dad,” Gus said, like this amused her.
“Oh, Gus,” Adam replied. “How’s that combination of lemon sorbet and peanut butter cup treating you?”
Gus took a big bite and mushed it around in her mouth a little.
Adam cringed.
Gus swallowed and grinned.
“Pretty good,” she declared.
Wes shuddered.
“Ah, to be young and unburdened by taste,” Adam said.
Gus ate her Frankenstein ice cream happily for a while and then turned her attention to Wes.
“Why aren’t you having Christmas with your family?” she asked.
Wes put his bowl down and addressed her seriously.
“Well, because I don’t get along with my parents or my sister. I haven’t seen them in years. You’re supposed to spend time with people who make you happy. But my family makes me feel bad. So I don’t spend time with them.”
Gus wrinkled her brow.
“Did they leave?”
“No. I left. I choose not to spend time with them.”
Gus’ mouth formed an O, like she didn’t know you could do that.
“Are you sad?” she asked.
“Nope. I’m happier not seeing them.”
“Oh.”
She thought about that for a while.
“I bet they’re sad.”
Wes’ face did something complicated.
“Why do you say that?”
Gus shrugged like it was obvious.
“You’re awesome. Too bad for them that they made you stay away.”
Wes blinked and Gus dropped her spoon into her empty bowl with a sigh.
“Well, I’m tired,” she announced, stretching dramatically. “Guess I’ll go to bed early.”
It was one minute before her bedtime so the pronouncement had less impact than she might have intended.
“Hey, thanks, Gus,” Wes said. He looked a little dazed.
She smiled.
“Night.”
* * *
Adam woke to eighty-three mentions on Instagram. Even when he’d used Instagram to try and drum up attention for his work he’d never woken to eighty-three mentions.
Wes had kissed him goodbye and gone home a few minutes earlier because Adam thought it would be good for Gus to have a low-key morning, given the events of the day before.
Blearily, Adam tapped the screen.
His most recent shot of himself and Gus in front of their lit-up house had apparently been shared under the hashtag WinterInWyoming and then landed in several people’s stories. One of them, an account with a million followers that comprised images of cozy cabins with roaring fires, mugs of cocoa cupped by mittened hands, and winter trees glazed with icicle lights, had shared the picture along with hands making a heart and a string of lights gif, commenting, “Dad and daughter Xmas goals. Adorable!!”
That account seemed to be the source of most of the shares. He liked the posts and reposted the stories, thrilled to show Gus.
He took his phone into her room and gently stroked her hair to wake her up.
“Morning, baby. Wanna see something cool?”
Gus nodded, instantly awake. She could never resist a line like that.
Adam showed her the reposted photograph and she flipped through the mentions expertly.
“Oh my god,” she breathed. “Are we famous?”
Adam laughed.
“Nah, but people seem to think we’re kinda cool.”
He winked at her in an aggressively uncool way and she laughed.
“Wish I had a phone so I could show people at school,” she said innocently.
Adam took a moment to bask in his utter relief that Gus did not have a phone, because he could only imagine the things she would show her classmates in the interest of scientific rigor.