17. Lisa

There must be something wrong with me.

A week without Ozadus, and I hardly know myself anymore. Even Zhara seems to feel the loss of him. While she’s too young to speak, it’s the way she bobs her head around the room. I know what she can’t yet say.

Where’s Daddy?

I thought, watching him walk out my door a week ago, that things would go back to square one. After all, I had grown used to things being just Zhara and me, and while Ozadus’ reemergence has been a surprise, I can’t yet say whether it’s a welcome surprise or not.

Still, after a few days, I find that my head bobs around looking for him, too. Every noise and my face lurches towards the door. Anything that sounds like a knock or a footstep has my attention. Anything.

I hear a knock at the door, and my head flashes towards it, wondering if it’s him.

“Oh, it”s you,” I say to Beth’s bright face, with a slight tone of disappointment.

“Good to see you, too,” she says sarcastically.

“Sorry, I just… I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

Beth has a suspicious look on her face but says nothing. She eyes me sideways before walking to Zhara. “What about you, sweet pea? Are you happy to see me?”

Zhara gurgles and spits while Beth picks her up. All seems well until, without warning, my little bean starts crying.

“I’m sorry,” I say, taking her from my friend. “We’re all out of sorts today. I don’t know what it is.”

“I do,” she says matter of factly. There’s a reason for her tone, and despite being well aware of it myself, it”s a subject I”m not ready to broach yet. No with her, not with myself, not with anyone.

I return her answer with silence, my best defense against the things I can’t yet imagine. How would this even work? Ozadus has made a lot of changes, sure, but what do I have to trust that these changes are of the real, lasting kind? Can I expect a career criminal to turn a new leaf and keep up with that change? I just don’t know.

“So what brings you here?” I ask Beth, trying to put the whole question from my mind.

“I just wanted to check up on you girls,” she says. “You’ve been so quiet lately, I thought maybe you were…”

“What?” I demand when she hesitates. Beth and I are best friends, it”s not like her to approach a subject this carefully.

“Missing him?” she finally suggests.

“Me? Miss him?” I say, scoffing at the idea like it hasn”t been on my mind for the past seven days. “No way.”

Beth doesn”t draw attention to how much of a liar I am right now. Maybe she’s being nice, or maybe she doesn’t have time before another knock surprises us both completely. I look at Zhara and my mind jumps to Ozadus. But no, it can’t be.

I’m too chicken shit to answer it this time.

“I’ll get it,” Beth says with a cheeky grin. She opens the door to a hulking figure, carrying flowers, food, and a big stuffed Oolyte for our baby girl.

I don’t have any words, only shock. Beth is the first to speak.

“Ozadus, good to see you back.”

“I said I would return.”

I can”t help but be moved by the look on his face. He has consistency, even when it”s hard to believe. Or maybe it”s just me. Maybe I”ve grown too used to doing everything, or maybe I”ve gotten used to life pitting me against an easy path. Every time the road ahead looks easy, life has a way of putting me back in that place.

“Lisa,” he says awkwardly, handing me the flowers and holding the stuffy for Zhara, who giggles and tries to reach, not for the toy, but for her father.

“I’ll give you all some space,” Beth says, kissing Zhara on top of the forehead before she leaves me and Ozadus to deal with this awkwardness on our own.

“You’re surprised,” he says, fingering the tiny curls on top of Zhara’s head.

I blush, ashamed to admit the words, and knowing I must. “I… I wasn’t sure you were coming back.”

He nods, walking towards the table and setting the food down. The smell of hot granthem steak fills the air, displacing my senses for a moment.

“I said I would,” he says calmly, and though I remember his words, it”s trusting them that will take time.

“You did,” I reply, equally calm. It’s a dance of our two mutually matched intellects. Neither of us is willing to give the other too much or too little.

“So I want you to know,” he says, setting the food out on the table. “I’ve set myself up here for a while. I’ve got a temporary place to stay, and I”ve picked up a few jobs here so that I can be local for the next few weeks.”

His words strike a chord inside me, but I’m too guarded to consider the possibility that this will work. Not yet. There’s something I need first, and it”s up to him to read between the lines if he wants to know what that is.

“But I don’t want to impose on you and Zhara,” he continues, matching my lack of response with his own intensity as he gazes into my eyes. “Just let me know what you think.”

My eyes shoot over to my baby daughter, seeing the wonder in her eyes as she stares at him. It’s hard, but there are allowances I can make. Despite my feeling that I want to run into his arms, for her I must be constant. If wants to stay, he needs to prove he’s necessary to us. If he wants a life with us, he has to show us that we just can’t do without him.

“I tell you what,” I say, an idea starting to form in my mind. “I’ve been wanting to be able to stay at work later in the evenings with Beth. We work better together, and it would allow us the chance to take on bigger clients. But I need a dedicated sitter. Every day.”

He seems interested, and I can”t think of a better way for him to prove he means to change my opinion of him.

“Okay,” he says, rubbing his blue chin. “I can make that work.”

“Great,” I reply, feeling like I’ve found it. A way to know for sure if he means business with us, or if he’s just holding us down until the next big score comes along. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Tomorrow comes, and to my surprise, Ozadus arrives on time with a bag full of new things for Zhara.

“You’re early, and you’ve got toys,” I say as a matter of observation. I don”t know what I expected, but this isn”t it.

“Yeah.” He smiles, clearly proud of himself. “I know she’s too young for most of this, but I couldn”t help myself. I’m excited.”

“Excited?”

“Sure. A little daddy-daughter day, just me and my best girl.” He picks Zhara up and kisses her cheek over and over, forcing tiny squeals of laughter from her tiny mouth.

Leaving him behind feels strange, especially with our daughter in his care. But he did come back, and I feel like he’s earned a little one-on-one time with her, even if it”s hard for me.

“Say bye-bye to Mommy,” he says, holding her and waving her little hand as I leave the house.

I spend the next few hours in a fit of panic. What was I thinking? He’s hardly qualified for childcare. He doesn”t know the first thing to do. What if she misses me? What if she gets upset that I’m not there?

My panic melts as soon as I open the door to my house. My jaw drops. It’s spotless.

“You cleaned?” I ask as he hands her to me. She’s happy, freshly changed, and fed with the first spurt of a yawn starting on her lips. In short, he did everything I would’ve done and more.

“It’s nothing.” He shrugs my wonder away. “You deserve to come home to a clean house. You work hard, it’s the least I could do.”

The next day I work, I worry a little less. It’s easier, too, when Ozadus calls me during my meal break and shows me all is well.

“She loves peas. I couldn”t believe how much she ate,” he reports back to me with as much enthusiasm for her every little experience as I”ve had.

“I can’t wait to see you–” I have to stop myself from saying the words. What would happen if I breached that subject? If I said how much I can”t wait to see both of them?

“Tell Mommy bye-bye,” he says as I hang up the phone to finish my shift.

The rest of the night, he’s all I can think about. I want to trust him, I do, and coming home that night to a clean house and homemade meal makes the trust all that much easier to give.

I have to hand it to Ozadus. The worth he’s trying to prove to me isn”t something I can ignore. At the very bare bones, he’s shown himself to be a fabulous roommate.

“It looks great in here,” I say, remarking on the clean kitchen and sink. With everything around me organized and put away neatly, it’s hard to hold the smile inside.

There’s more I want to give him. More I want to share. If he keeps this up, he might just become a roommate I can’t do without.

“Well,” he says, rising to leave. “I guess I’ll see you all tomorrow.”

He takes his turn to leave, giving me a hopeful look as he goes. Each time he takes the walk away from us, I feel a pull deep in my gut. Every time we do this dance and say goodbye, I find myself wishing he could stay.

Yep. Something’s definitely wrong with me.