I almost laugh. By all means, I want to do what’s best for my sister’s child and do right by my niece, but I’m not in a position to look after a child. Ha! I mentally scoff just thinking about showing back up at Brent’s place with a four-year-old in tow. That would go over well. He doesn’t even like dogs. Hey, babe, oh, why yes, that’s a child I have with me. Now do you want to give in and end things? Great!
And can I also mention I’m only twenty-six, for God’s sake! How would I care for a little girl? I’m barely a grown-up myself.
Officer Belmont pats me on my shoulder. “I’m sorry to give you so much upsetting news at once. I’m sure once you meet your niece you’ll know what’s best.”
He removes his palm from my shoulder and stands. I rise along with him, adjusting my top and placing my arm through my purse strap.
“Can you please tell me what is next? I would like to get my sister the proper burial so we can all move on from his tragedy.”
“Yes, of course. Visitation is scheduled at the funeral home for tomorrow afternoon. I assume you’ll be staying at your sister’s house with your niece. John’s cousin is at the house watching her. So we can head over there now. He’s spent a lot of time with the family, so we thought it best to have him close right now. Keep some sort of familiarity in the girl’s life.”
“I understand.” We walk out of the station and he instructs me to follow him to the house. I replay the comment about keeping familiarity in the poor girl’s life. How do you do that when she’s just lost her parents? Does she understand what’s happened? Does she even know about me? How does me landing on her front steps equal familiarity in her little life?
The whole drive is spent agonizing over meeting this little girl who scares me more than a technology outage. What exactly do I do? Introduce myself? Hi, I’m your horrible aunt who never came around. And I think your mommy hated me, so how about we figure out where to put you for the rest of your life? Vomit in a handbag, I am in official freak-out mode.
Don’t yack . . . don’t yack, I coach myself as I try and calm my nerves.
Just as I feel I’m coming back down to stable ground, a car full of off-tune singing teenagers swerves into my lane, causing me to jerk out of their way. “Learn how to drive the speed limit, gramma!” a snarky little teenage diva yells out the window as they pass by.
“Oh, hell to the no,” I grumble to myself.
My patience, along with some coffee from the container in my hand, goes spilling into my lap. I mean who seriously drives like that? Society has really lost their hold on the youth today. Teaching them nothing about the rules of the road. There are lines there for a reason, people! I take it into my own hands to provide proper demonstration of how to be courteous to other drivers. Unfortunately, I plan on doing it in the proper way next time. This time, of course, once we hit the stoplight, I sledge my Starbucks coffee container out my window, making its new home in a splattered mess on the mini prima donna’s windshield. As the light turns green, I enjoy the shocked faces of all the divas-in-training. I make it my job as a safe driver to give them my parental advice by pointing at the speed limit sign . . . with my middle finger.
S AFELY GETTING ME OFF the road, we finally pull into the driveway of a one-story brick house. I put my rental car in park and wait for Officer Belmont to get out of his cruiser. I feel my phone buzz in my lap and I jump.
Nope, not nervous at all.
I need to seriously pull my shit together. I am Christina motherfuckin’ Daniels. I can do this. I pick up my phone, denying the shakiness in my hands. I’m sliding the lock off when tapping at my window startles me senseless again. I send my phone into the air, and it nosedives down into the tiny crack between the door and the driver’s seat.
I look up to see Henry instructing me to roll