Three Years Old

Chapter One

     I bent over, prying her fingers from where she was gripping the stretchy material of my jeans. Placing my hands beneath her armpits I dragged her up to sit on my right hip, on the other side of me from Blake. ‘What do you think of our new home Flick?’ I asked her.

     She buried her head in my chest, hiding her eyes. ‘I don’t like it,’ came her voice. It wavered a little as she said the words, as if she might burst into tears at any moment, but I knew she wasn’t really going to. She was not a drama queen; she saved her tears for moments of real angst, knowing that this way, when she did cry, it would have a much greater influence on us. That was one of the many things that made her remarkably intelligent for a three-year-old.

     Blake laughed next to me, a ringing noise, that sounded more like it should have belonged to our daughter than to her. ‘You’ll learn to like it sweetie,’ she told Flick. She moved her eyes to me and gave me a smile, the kind of smile that, if you know the person right, says more than words.

     ‘Did you manage to get a hold of the movers then?’ she asked me.

     I shook my head. ‘I rung, but no answer,’ I told her. ‘Hopefully that’s because they’re on their way.’ Blake looked a little worried at this, probably just unsure what we would do if all our furniture didn’t arrive. ‘Don’t panic,’ I advised her. ‘I left them a message asking if they could tell us when they were almost here.’

     ‘Well it’s easy for you to say not to panic, it’s your lack of caring and forgetfulness that made them late in the first place,’ she teased me.

     I laughed at this, then shifted Flick’s weight to the other side of my body and leant towards Blake. ‘Take her for a moment would you?’ I said, though Blake was already silently taking our daughter in her arms. I moved away from them to the door of our new house, hearing Blake’s voice behind me telling Flick that she was getting too old to be carried places.

     I pulled the door closed, and it let out a satisfying click. I already had my keys in my hand, the brand new one among the very, very old and used it to lock the house. ‘Should we go to my mum’s for a while, instead of hanging out in an empty house?’ I suggested, turning around and walking back over to the car where she was still standing with Flick in her arms.

    ‘That sounds like a good plan, doesn’t it Flick?’ she asked the bundle in her arms. ‘Wouldn’t you like to see your grandma Dee again?’

     Flick lifted her face up and looked from Blake, to me and back to Blake, tilting her head to the side. ‘Which one’s grandma Dee?’

     I laughed, feeling a surge of affection for her. It wasn’t her fault she couldn’t remember who was who in the family; she had twice as many grandparents as a normal child. Though she was officially ours, and didn’t fully understand the situation at only three-years-old, Debby and Michael were her godparents, and we treated their extended family like our extended family too. So Flick found herself with seven grandparents, an uncle Rob on Debby’s side, and three aunts and an uncle on Blake’s side. We were lucky that Blake was the only one with lots of siblings, as she already found it hard enough to remember everyone’s names.

     Blake laughed too, then said, ‘You’ll see honey, just pretend like you remember her when you meet her.’

     She put her down on the ground, and the two of us started out of the drive, heading towards my mum’s house. Flick trotted along beside us, taking two steps for every one we did, but not being phased. Though she enjoyed being carried around or travelling by pushchair, when she wanted to be she was an excellent walker, and we both knew that she could deal with the five-minute walk out of town.

     However, Blake and I still went at a strolling pace, to accommodate for our daughter’s considerably shorter legs. Blake reached out a hand as we walked and took mine.

     ‘You still feeling confident about this decision?’ she asked me.

      I glanced over at her and saw that the hand not in mine was playing with a strand of her hair, and she didn’t look at me as she spoke, but kept her eyes focused in front of her. I knew she was only really looking for an opportunity for me to convince her further that this was the right thing to do. I’d never been the one that was worried.

     ‘Yes,’ I told her, even though we both knew that already. ‘We don’t want Flick growing up in London. You hated it. I just want her to be happy.’

     Blake nodded. We’d been through this before, but she still didn’t seem sure. I let out a little sigh and carried on. ‘And this is the ideal place for our work too. Little art galleries have always done well in St. David’s, it’s just so picturesque. Yeah, it might be a while until we start making a profit, but my mum’s happy to help until then.’

     She nodded gently again, and carried on fiddling with the strand of hair. I stopped suddenly, forcing her to stop too with my grip on her hand. Flick carried on, up the pavement, running her little fingers through the leaves of the bush that bordered the path.

    I pulled gently on Blake’s hand to get her to face me. ‘Blake,’ I said. ‘Stop worrying. It will be fine. What’s the worst that can happen?’

     She dropped my hand and started rubbing her arm with it. ‘We could lose all our money,’ she pointed out. ‘Go bankrupt.’

      ‘And even if we do, we’ll get out of it,’ I told her. ‘We have savings. My mum’s here for us. It will be okay.’

     I put my hand on the back of her neck and pulled her into me. I placed my lips on hers gently. I felt her relax slightly under the contact and when I pulled away she was wearing a small smile.

     ‘Okay,’ she said, letting out a long breath. ‘I’m okay. We’re okay. This, here, it’s gonna work.’

     ‘That’s the attitude!’ I cried with glee. I glanced down the road, at the little figure retreating, away from us. ‘Come on, we better go catch up with our daughter!’

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Sooo?? What do you think? Please vote and comment! :) Next chapter will be up on Thursday or Saturday, depending on how much homework I get this week.