Erick winced and held the phone away from his ear.
“Are you finished?” he asked when the sound died and the ringing in his ear subsided.
“I need a brown paper bag. I’m hyperventilating.”
“Better than puking, I guess.”
“How could you do that to Clover? She’s a goddess. You are not worthy of her goddess-ness.”
“That kind of hurts, kid.”
“You know as well as I do she’d never done that before.”
“This is not something I ever wanted to talk about with my daughter.”
“And you know as well I do she didn’t tell you that because she knew you’d wuss out on her.”
“Apparently I am talking about this with my daughter.”
“You know as well as I do that you didn’t give her the first time she deserves.”
“I have no comment here.”
“Oh, Clover won’t complain. No, Clover is a goddess and goddesses don’t complain. She’s too big for that. But on the inside, she’s disappointed. Were there candles? Were you in a nice hotel room? Did you make it special? No. Of course you didn’t because you didn’t know. You just went right for it, didn’t you?”
Erick screamed. It felt good. It felt right. He’d never screamed before like that. Felt primal.
“Pops?”
“Sorry, I was just trying to get you to shut the hell up. I hope it worked.”
“It mostly worked. I’m calmer now.”
“Good. Because I’m really done having this conversation with you.”
“You and me both. I need to talk to Clover.”
“You don’t need to do that. She is fine. She is dandy. She is both fine and dandy and she does not need any relationship advice from a teenage girl.”
“That’s sexist and ageist, Pops. You’re backsliding without me there to keep you in line. I should come back. Clover probably needs me.”
“She is seeing your father, not you. She does not need you. She needs me.”
“Hell, yeah, she does. She needs you to clean up the disaster you made of her first time.”
“It wasn’t a disaster. It was anything but a disaster.”
“So you admit it. Ha! I knew it.”
Erick rubbed the bridge of his nose and wondered briefly if he could legally put his seventeen-year-old daughter up for adoption.
“Now I know why ancient Greeks used to leave their kids to be raised by wolves. I think the wolves might have done a better job with you. Or eaten you,” Erick said.
“They weren’t the Greeks, they were Romans. And this is unfair. I did nothing wrong. You are the villain in this scenario. You had a responsibility here to do something awesome for someone awesome. Sexuality is a gift from Mother Nature and we honor it by honoring Her and we honor Her by honoring each other and the only sin in this world is to dishonor the gifts we’re given by treating them lightly or taking them for granted.”
“Are you a druid now? I can’t keep up.”
“Listen, I know Clover. She’s too nice to complain, but inside, she probably wishes it had been a little more romantic, but she doesn’t know how to ask for what she wants.”