“Pretty soon, you’ll see my art up and down this entire street,” I say in a nonchalant way.
Aimee’s bleached blonde hair swings in her ponytail, bouncing off her face when she whips around to look at me. “You little fucker! How come you didn’t tell me sooner? Was that what you were doing in there?”
I hoist another chair up. “I just found out. Cool, huh?”
“Fuckin’ badass, Mars.”
We chat as we clean up and soon I walk her out to her car. I give her a quick hug before heading inside. Once the doors are locked and the lights are shut down, I head down the hall past the office to the back stairwell. When Aimee hired me, I found out she was renting a small two-bedroom apartment upstairs. The rent was ridiculously cheap. Sage and I were all too happy to leave our shithole apartment in downtown Memphis to take this gem.
And oh what a gem it is.
I pull out my keys from my pocket and unlock the door. The apartment is quiet, but I know my night owl of a wife is awake. Even though she doesn’t have classes now that it’s summer, I imagine she’ll be painting. I lock the door behind me and empty my pockets on the entryway table. The apartment is clean, dark, and quiet. Tiptoeing through our home, I make my way into our bedroom. She has the terrace door open and her easel is set right in front of it. With her back to me, I take a moment to admire her from behind.
Tonight, she’s beautiful in a fitted black tank top and black yoga pants. Her raven hair is braided neatly down her back, leaving her neck open and exposed. My mouth waters to mark her pretty neck up.
“Hey, beautiful.”
She turns and flashes me a bright smile. “Hey, handsome.” Her chin nicks toward the open doors. “Full moon. Too beautiful not to paint.”
I walk up behind her and massage her shoulders as I kiss the top of her head. Her painting is more than just a moon, though. It’s a bird’s eye view of the moon from Mars. All the planets from Mars to the moon have been drawn to scale. I can tell the perspective is from Mars’s view because just a little bit of red-orange peeks from the corner of the canvas. It’s cool as shit.
“Do I get to keep this one?” I tease.
“Nope. Not yours.”
I dip down and kiss the side of her throat as my palms slide to her breasts. “Can I convince you to give it to me?”
“Never in a million years,” she tells me with a smile in her voice. “The planets belong to our Star.”
My heart warms at her words.
For so long, my life was dark and depressing. Now, it fucking twinkles. My life is perfect. I hear the voice that always stops my heart through the monitor perched on our dresser.
“DaddaDaddaDadda.”
Sage starts to rise but I stop her with a kiss to her mouth. “Stay. Finish your painting.” Her fingers run through my hair and she nods.
I pull away and kick off my shoes. After a quick change out of my work clothes into a T-shirt and pajama pants, I slip out of our room to the only other bedroom in our apartment. As soon as I open the door, I see my sweet Star standing in her crib. Her raven hair is in disarray and her denim blue eyes pierce my heart.
“Hey, baby,” I coo as I approach her.
She holds onto the side and her knees buckle a few times—one, two, three—like she’s getting ready to jump out. But she doesn’t. Our daughter isn’t like most toddlers her age. At almost two, she should be terrorizing us at every turn.
Not Star.
Our Star is quiet and withdrawn. She scores a little behind in the speech and social aspects of her developmental milestones, but she’s miles ahead on her fine motor skills. Star can hold a paintbrush and will sit with the patience of a saint for long periods of time with her mother as they paint. She may not speak in sentences yet, or like to make eye contact, but she’s brilliant.
Sage worries about her, but Charles and I both assure her Star is going to be just fine. She may have a genetic disadvantage with her parents being half siblings, but she’s perfect as far as I can tell. It was enough to worry Sage, though, to the point she’s religious about taking her birth control. We were both only children—until way later in life—and we turned out okay, despite everything. Until Sage realizes our daughter is just shy and awkward like her mother, and slightly broody like her father, she’ll keep on taking that birth control.
“Come to Daddy,” I whisper as I pick up my little girl. She smells like baby shampoo and I inhale her familiar scent. “Did you miss Daddy?”