Total pages in book: 78
Estimated words: 76203 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 381(@200wpm)___ 305(@250wpm)___ 254(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76203 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 381(@200wpm)___ 305(@250wpm)___ 254(@300wpm)
“I’m going to be nice to your mom too,” I told her.
Denali gave me a nod at that and reached up for her mother’s hand. Runa took it and gave her daughter a smile. “Didn’t you want to ask York a very important question?”
My stomach tightened, wondering what the hell that might be.
“What animal do you want to see?” she asked, making some of the tension slip out of my spine. “Mommy wants to see a white tiger.”
“White tigers are cool. What do you want to see?”
“Elephants. And giraffes.”
“Well, let’s go see some then.”
We stepped up toward the ticket booth, and Runa reached to draw the pack off her back, but I was quicker, buying the three tickets, then leading them through the opening.
We were almost immediately greeted by flamingos, which Denali cooed and gushed over—seemingly because they were pink, which used to be her favorite color. But now it was purple. But she liked yellow too. And sparkles. And rainbows.
Any worries I’d had about her being shy flew out the window as I desperately tried to funnel away everything she was saying so I knew her a little better.
Runa and I were mostly silent, save to answer a few of her questions.
But outside the tortoise enclosure, she’d met up with another little girl, and the two of them got to talking.
Runa took a few deliberate steps back, and I followed.
“She’s chattier than I expected.”
“Yeah, she’s a big talker. Which I encourage. Especially when it’s other kids. She doesn’t get to spend a lot of time with them.”
“She’s not in school?”
“Not yet. Soon. Maybe.”
“Why maybe?”
“We… move around a lot,” she admitted.
“That why you’re here? Because you’re tired of moving around a lot?”
“Well, I mean, we’re here now because I got that tip. I’d all but given up hope about it.”
“How’d you get a tip?”
Runa’s face scrunched up. “Well, that’s a little humiliating. But I put up posters.”
“Posters? Of me?”
“Yeah. I found someone who did sketches, described you to them, and they produced something that looked a lot like you. So I had posters made up.”
“What’d they say?”
“That’s the embarrassing part. They said, “Help me track down my baby daddy.”
“Oof.”
“Yeah. Sorry. But I didn’t think anyone would give me any directions if they saw a picture of you. People pretty universally hate deadbeat dads. I mean, not that you are one. You didn’t even know you were a dad, but I—”
“Runa,” I cut her off. “It’s alright. You were trying to find me. I don’t care what you lied about to do that.”
She nodded. “I drove all around New York state and posted them up when I was over that way, not sure I’d get anywhere, but figuring it was worth a shot. I wanted you to know you had a daughter. Whether you wanted to be involved with her or not.”
“I do. For the record, I do want to be involved.”
Her gaze flicked away, but not before I saw the relief there.
“Been hard?”
“Raising Denali? No. I mean, yes. Babies are hard, obviously. Especially alone.”
“So you were alone.”
“Yeah, I was alone. But I was young. And didn’t sleep that much anyway. And Denny was a really good baby. I think she slept through the night by four months. It wasn’t that bad. The first year was actually pretty good. We had a nice little place, and I had a decent job. We were doing well.”
“Before all the moving around.”
“Yeah, before—”
“Mommy,” Denali cut in, making us both realize her little friend had moved on. “What’s next?”
I glanced down at the map I was holding. “Warthogs.” Denali’s face scrunched up. “They do have three warts,” I told her. “And big tusks.”
By the time we made our way past the otters—Denali’s favorite so far—she was begging for a piggyback ride because her little feet hurt.
It was a massive park. I honestly didn’t know how she’d gone so far without being picked up.
Instead of piggybacking, though, Runa swung the kid up onto her shoulders so she could still see everything without any obstruction.
But by the time we made it over to the gazelles and antelope and other deer-like animals, Runa was apologizing and lowering the kid back down.
“Mommy’s shoulders are hurting, munchkin. You’re going to need to walk for a little bit.”
It was the first time the whole day Denali looked anything less than thrilled. Her little lower lip popped out, and her brows came down.
“But my feet hurt too.”
“You know,” I said as a look of panic crossed Runa’s face. Understandably. We were only halfway through the park. There was no way she could carry the grumpy kid the rest of the way. “I have really strong shoulders.”
“They look big,” Denali said, craning her head back to look at me.
“Yep. I lift heavy weights just in case I need them to be really strong.”
“Like for carrying things?”