“What?”
She touched the cow against my chest.
“Muuu, Daddy.”
Grace woke up.
Sophie stepped up staggering.
Within seconds, the three of them were screaming some variation of “dad” while demanding noises from farm animals.
I handed the cow to Emma.
“One second.”
Then I walked quietly to the bathroom.
I closed the door. I stopped breathing.
I sat on the toilet lid.
And I cried with both hands on my face.
A tiny finger appeared under the door.
Then another.
Then a third.
“Daddy?”
I laughed as I cried harder.
“You three are supposed to be asleep.”
They were not my daughters.
Not technically.
They were my sisters. I stopped breathing.
But life had stopped worrying about technicalities long before that.
Two years earlier, I had come home with news that would be supposed to change my life.
Chicago.
Real work.
Good salary.
Benefits.
My first apartment that I didn’t share with three other college kids and a refrigerator that permanently smelled like onions.
