Hedgehogs Dilemma

Goodbye may seem forever

One of the first things Nathalie can remember was sitting at the large wooden table in her father's apartment one Sunday morning. In front of her she had a large white piece of paper on which she had tried to draw a landscape with a house, flowers, the sun and her family with wax crayons. She herself was just tall enough that her chest touched the edge of the table, making it hard for her to reach the end of the paper.
Next to here where a white cup of cocoa, from which she occasionally took a sip.
She remembered how proudly she had immortalized herself and her father on the paper and how joyfully she had shown him the picture.
But of course, her life began much earlier.

"I finally put her to sleep..." announced the woman, who just entered the kitchen. She had forced her dark brown hair into a bun, which by now more took the shape of a messy bun.
As clothing she wore a wide white shirt, which she probably borrowed from her husband years ago and forgot to return or who used to be the actual owner. She looked a lot like Nathalie when she is an Adult just with the wrong hair colour and with out the glasses.
She slowly reached for the coffee machine with her hand.
"You want another coffee this late?"
"The little one doesn't sleep through the night anyway.. I can stay awake straight away."
"You know I also get up to comfort Nath when she starts crying."
Without comment, the woman leaned against the nearest wall, cup in hand. "You're far too focused on your work.." she replied before gesturing to the books that were open in front of the man. This himself wore a white T-shirt and a light blue shirt, which he was open. His hair was dark brown, short and under his eyes he had noticeable dark circles.
"Anyway, you'll be gone soon anyway, then it's just my work again. So don't even bother." the woman replied coolly and she took another sip from the cup.
Hurt by these words, the man closed the book he had spread out in front of him.
"I thought we wanted to work on the relationship and hold on. For Nathalie."
"Now what don't you like about what I said?"
"You act like I don't care about Nathalie. Like it's too much work for me!"
"It's just the truth."
The man clutched some of his papers in anger before jumping to his feet and bracing himself on his hands on the table. "It is not! I love our daughter!" he announced loudly while slapping the table once. Silence filled the room as both adults looked deep into each other's eyes, blazing with pure hatred. But the silence didn't last long.
The argument between the two had caused the baby to wake up again.
Annoyed, the woman put the cup aside, but before she could even comment on how his screaming had made Nathalie wake up again, the man had pushed past her out of the kitchen.

He carefully took the little crying Nathalie in his arms and sat down with her in the rocking chair that was in the room with them.
He gently began to rock back and forth on it while holding his little girl in his arms while making soft "Shhhh" noises.
Ever since she was born he had been fascinated by her. She was now 1 year and a few months old and yet she was very bright for her age. Wearily, she blinked the tears from her eyes to look at the man who was now rocking her gently.
He looked back at her with a smile and quickly poked her nose with his finger, which made her suddenly giggle. Hastily she wriggled her little arms out of the blanket in which she had been rolled up to reach for his finger. How small her fingers were compared to his hand.
With another giggle, she clutched the finger in hers, only to be utterly mesmerized by what she was doing the next moment. Like she's proud to have done it. Or at least has been able to do it.
This sight also brought him to a short laugh.
He leaned back in his chair and softly began to hum the beginning of a tune. Curiously, the child now looked from the finger to his face, which he found amusing and the humming, a little louder, continued.
He liked the song very much. Couldn't wait to sing to his daughter one day when she was older. But not now when she should be sleeping. And so he just went through the lyrics in his head.

It's not time to make a change
Just relax, take it easy
You're still young, that's your fault
There's so much you have to know
Find a girl, settle down
If you want you can marry
Look at me, I'm old, but I'm happy