Fates | Book 2 ✔️

[13]

I lift Emery onto my shoulders, so he could reach the apples on the tree.  I think it is a much better, safer idea than watching him trying to climb a tree so high and falling off. Yorin tells me not to coddle and I'm not. I just don't want a thing to ever happen to him. I can't say that he doesn't understand because he has a son himself. Really, I just... 

Emery stands and balances on my shoulders causing my eyes to go wide. 

"Emery—"

"I'll be fine." He climbs onto a branch and waves at me making me bite down on my lip. Soon he starts shaking one of the branches causing apples to fall on my head. 

"You have to catch them!" Emery yells laughing at the same time. 

This kid really isn't afraid of anything which I find amazing and scary all at the same time. 

"How many do I have to get?"

"All of them!"

"That's a whole lotta apples. What are you going to make?"

"I'm not telling you," he sings causing me to smile. 

"Ten. I'll get ten apples."

"Ten's fine." He shakes the branch again causing more to fall off hitting me in the head again. 

"You have enough apples down here now. Come here." 

I reach my arms out to him, but he backs away into the trunk of the tree. He shakes his head and holds on to it tight. 

"I can get down myself. Stop babying me." 

My lips purse before I sigh out. He's growing to be more independent by the day, I swear. He acts a lot older than his age suggests. He's definitely taller than the average three going on four-year-old. He looks a lot like four going on five, so it's no wonder why he acts like this. 

"Emery, I don't want you to hurt yourself." 

"I can do it."

"Emery."

"I can!" 

I smile and nod this time. "I bet you can't make it here," I say pointing to my chest. 

"I can too." 

"I bet you can't." 

He loosens his grip on the tree and turns slowly to face me. Before I have the time to extend my arms back out, Emery jumps onto me pushing me onto the ground while laughing at the same time. 

"See, told you. I can do it," he says as he sits up and stares at me. 

"Your other daddy would have killed me if he saw that." 

That only causes him to laugh more making me flick him playfully on the forehead. He is a bit of a troublemaker, but who wasn't at this age? I definitely was. 

"Let's play again."

"Oh, no-no-no." 

He gets from over me and tries to crawl away, but I hover over him and wrap him up in my arms before he can get far. It only makes him laugh more.

Emery falls asleep in my arms on the way back. It is growing late into the evening and the sun is about nearly down. After all the climbing, running and jumping he had done, it's no wonder he knocked out so early. I kiss his cheek causing him to turn his head and snuggle closer into me.

All of my time has been spent with him lately and I couldn't possibly think of any other way to spend it and who to spend it with other than him. He's a really cute kid with little quirks of his own that I've fallen in love with. I want to be there to watch him grow and see what kind of person he'll become. With that, my heart can truly rest easy. He had taken it, after all.