“You should go change!” my father yells from the living room. “I’ll wait here.”
We walk down the hallway past the billiard room and hear my mother and Avery talking in the second bedroom. “I love tea parties,” Avery says from the bedroom. “Do you think I need a crown?”
“Of course, my love.” I hear my mother, and Addison looks at me.
“Fine,” she grumbles, “I’ll give her the tea party, but we have to have limits.” She holds up the dress. I just nod. “Silence isn’t golden,” she mumbles as she walks into the master bedroom. “There are no closets?” She looks around the bedroom and I point at the wall on the side. “Here we go,” she says and I sit on the king-size bed, waiting for her to freak out. I know this is too much for her, but knowing how much my family loves her is everything. Knowing for five years she didn’t have any support and now she has us is, well, there are no words for that.
“Stefano.” She comes out of the walk-in closet. “There is a floor-length cape dress.” She walks back into the closet. “There are also more clothes in here than I own at home.”
I get up, walking over to the closet, and see both sides stuffed as if we live here. “If it makes you feel better, she bought clothes for me also.”
“That does not make me feel better at all.” She shakes her head, and fifteen minutes later she walks out of the closet wearing a long floral skirt with a sleeveless white shirt. “These shoes—” She lifts her dress. “These are the ones from Sex in the City. They are the Carrie shoes.” She points at the blue shoe. “They also cost eight hundred and ninety dollars,” she huffs. “Trust me, I know because they are my dream shoes.”
“You look beautiful,” I compliment her, “so, so beautiful.” I get up and she looks at me as I wear my beige linen suit. “Shall we go?”
“Sure,” she says as I slide my hand into hers. “I’m doing this for Avery,” she mumbles to me as we walk out, “and for your mom.”
“Thank you,” I say as we walk toward the living room. There is a woman in the corner playing the harp.
“Our daughter is going to have to marry the King of England at this point.” She side-eyes me as
we see the outside patio has been transformed with a round table in the middle. The table has trays of food all over it and of course teapots everywhere.
My parents are taking pictures of Avery, who is dressed like Cinderella, with a crown on her head. “Show the shoes, my love,” my mother urges her and she smiles as she picks up her dress and shows us glass shoes. “You are a true princess.” My father looks at my mother with all the love in the world. I know she pushes it, but this is how she shows her love. What I didn’t tell Addison is the number of times my mother has cried because she missed so much. The number of times she calls me to make sure I’m making them feel loved. This is her way of making up for lost time. “I love you so much.”
We walk out onto the patio but Addison doesn’t follow me, so I stop. “I can’t go out there,” she says to me as she wrings her hands in front of her.
“What, why not?” I ask her, wondering if she is sick.
“I can’t mess up the bottom of the shoes or else we can’t return them,” she says softly.
“Addison.” I grab her face in my hands. “Those shoes are never being returned, my love.” I see how her eyes get big when I call her my love. “Now, let’s have tea with our daughter.”
addison
. . .
H e stands in front of me, this man who has literally thrown my world upside down, asking me to have tea with our daughter. Our daughter. The tears so evident in his eyes that he wants to give this moment to our daughter. If I wasn’t sure I loved him before, I love him now. This whole day has been out of a dream. It’s been out of a fairy tale, to say the very least. Being swept away in a private plane to my bucket-list destination. Then to have this suite that is four times the size of my apartment, to having a whole closet full of clothes that I would only dream of buying. To walking out to a harp playing for a tea party for a four-year-old. It’s literally the definition of a fairy tale. These things don’t happen, at least I didn’t think they did.
“Okay,” I give in and take a step forward, even though inwardly I cringe thinking about the fact I can’t ever return these shoes.
The pair of shoes that were going to be my gift to myself after I booked fifty clients, are now on my feet. “Oh, there they are,” Markos says, looking at us and smiling. He also has changed into a suit, his hands in his pockets.