I skirt my way through the living room, bending over to pick up one of Ruby’s dolls from the floor, and bound up the stairs taking two at a time. how to conduct the perfect princess tea party. Kate patiently helped me establish a routine and taught me how to braid hair, distinguish excited shrieks from cries of pain, and most important. It wasn’t always like that, and thank God for Kate’s help or I would have gone insane in those first few months of becoming a single parent of two little girls. They’ve been here almost six months and I actually feel like I know what the hell I’m doing now. While she still loves for me to braid her hair and help with her homework, she’s also relished taking on a bit of a caretaker role since the girls moved in with me permanently this past summer.

I don’t bother waiting to see what she does, because Violet has become my metaphorical right hand over the last few months. “Get the cereal and milk out for me while I go see what your sister needs?” “Do me a favor,” I tell her as I turn toward the living room. I love the sprinkle of freckles on her nose and it compels me to kiss her again. Violet leans her head back and gives me an upside-down grin. Leaning over, I place a kiss on her head. “I’ll be right there,” I tell her as I finish the last of Violet’s braid and manage to efficiently bind it with a hair elastic. Throwing in some manners to throw me off my game. When I don’t answer her right away, she calls down in a sweet voice that makes my heart pitter-patter. but you have to come here,” she yells, and, to give her credit, it’s toned down just a bit. “Have aliens landed?” I keep my voice just loud enough to carry up the stairs but still decibels below her own.

Her little voice shouts back to me in a squawk.

“Is the house on fire, Rubes?” I call out. At almost five years old, she refuses to accept the concept of a well-mannered, indoor voice and goes balls to the wall in everything she does. I’ve since come to recognize that particular shrill cry as one of excitement and wonder, and I can’t help but grin over what Ruby is possibly into now. It’s a sound that once used to cause all the hair to stand up on my arms and on more than one occasion caused me to go tearing after the call of my youngest daughter thinking she was being murdered by an intruder.

Ryker by Sawyer Bennett