Accidentally on Purpose

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Wait, whoa, whoa, whoa, how the hell did we escalate to this this fast?

Psh. He was so not asking me out. Was he?

I was starting to spiral, and by some miracle I kept my face neutral as I stared back at him.

"It's cold outside," I said, gesturing to the bad weather outside. It had started to get colder and colder, and even though it didn't rain all that much, the temperature had been pretty low. It surely didn't seem to be a great time to take a walk in the park with a baby.

He shrugged. "Then throw on your coat."

I stifled a smile, and then I nodded after a while. "Alright. Sunday it is."

"Great, I'll pick you up Sunday morning," he murmured. "And uh, anyway, I just got a baby stroller—my neighbor's letting me borrow it."

"Awesome," I told him. He cast me another glance before nodding and going back behind the counter.

Once my back was turned to him, I looked down at Daisy, grinning at the permanent smile on her face.

"Guess what, baby girl," I cooed quietly as I poked her cheeks, making sure that no one could hear what I was saying but the two of us, "mommy's got a date with your daddy!"

Yeah, it felt weird to say it out loud, but it was awesome.

[]

"Oh my god, Daisy," I moaned, rolling over on my bed. It was five p.m. in a very wet, very rainy Saturday, and for the first time since the fake baby came into my life, I could finally catch some sleep...

Until thirty seconds ago, when she decided that two hours of good sleep for me was more than enough.

"You couldn't cry when I was actually wide awake watching Gossip Girl reruns, huh, Daisy?" I grunted as I dragged myself out of my bed. "What did I do to you? Why do you hate me so much?"

But she obviously didn't care about my complaining, because she kept crying and screaming for attention. I checked her feet first thing, and sure enough, it was blinking. I sighed and immediately changed her supposedly dirty diaper, exchanging it with the other diaper from her bag.

Her cries immediately ended once her diaper was changed, and I sighed in relief. At this rate, I wouldn't be able to fall back asleep no matter how much I wanted to.

So I dragged myself downstairs, to the living room where my little brother was building something with his lego pieces while simultaneously doing his math homework.

Yeah, that's my brother for you.

I rubbed my eyes tiredly, plopping myself into the couch. Cole looked up when he saw me and grinned, pointing at his lego.

"What's that?" I asked curiously.

"I'm building the New York City skyline," he announced. "The tall buildings and stuff. Isn't this cool?"

"It sure is." I smiled at him in amusement. "You go, Cole."

He was about to continue with his building, until his forehead scrunched as he looked at me. He frowned. "Daisy's been a trouble, huh?"

He and Daisy apparently had become acquaintances now. He accepted her as the newest temporary member in the family, and even offered if she needed to get fed. I never let him play with her, though, just in case. Everything could literally happen in Cole's hands.

The one thing he didn't approve of her presence was the lack of sleep that I got every night. It became more noticeable how restless I'd gotten each day, and apparently, my little brother didn't like it that much.