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In Tulsa, all was quiet. The moon was high in the sky and shone a pale, cold light on the flowering lemon tree in front of the quaint house.
Much of the yellow fruit had been picked and cleverly molded into pies, tarts, and sweet lemonade that could rot teeth but satisfy a thirst on a sweltering, summer night. An old motorbike of a passion was parked on the lawn, protected from the weather by a dark tarpaulin lazily draped over the silver rims. A few feet away, a stroller had been knocked over by the wind and laid absconded in the grass, where it would stay until someone remembered to take it inside.
Everyone was fast asleep and whisked to the land of dreams. But Dallas smelled the cloying scent of lemon as the wind rustled the fat green leaves of his wife's beloved tree. The damned fruit would haunt him every night, it seemed.
And Little Lou's piercing little cries.
"Alright, alright, kid, that's enough," Dallas mumbled, his hand locked onto the frilled wall of the wicker bassinet.
He gave it a little shake with whatever strength he could muster. The lone brown armchair he had swiped from Buck's roadhouse (his reward from a drunken bet placed with the crocked old man) was once comfortable. After having spent nigh every waking night in the worn seat, Dallas wanted to set it ablaze and watch the cinders disappear into the black of the night.
The leather creaked as he leaned over to press his lips against the babe's soft, wispy brown hair. She protested with a whine, her little fists punching the air with surprising strength. Must've been her mother's genes as Sodapop once attested.
(Suffice it to say, watching his little niece so often required him to turn up the volume on the television with how poor his hearing has grown.)
The babe's face scrunched up as her father huffed a chuckle, and tears pooled at the corner of her eyes.
Dally lifted the babe and tucked her closer to his chest, his arm encircling her tightly. Her fingers closed around a lock of his dark hair and she tugged, crying out once more when Dally shook his head free.
"Shhh, Lou," he pleaded. "You've got to stay quiet. You'll wake up the damn street."
Louisa "Lou" Susan Winston. Virginia had already decided on the name before she had given birth.
(The idea that anyone else would contest was a fruitless ambition, as she claimed to have been fully in the right by carrying the child in the first place.)
He debated moving to another room, but the creaky armchair was comfortable, and he liked having both his girls with him this late. Even if one was being difficult, and the other was deeply asleep.
He looked on the other side of the room, at the familiar form that laid under the covers haphazardly thrown around the couch. There she was, the love of his life. His wife, and the mother of his child. The one who had done so much for him and the world, without ever asking for anything in return.
For a moment, he didn't mind the scent of lemons.
Virginia had been such a great woman for him, he truly thought he didn't deserve her. So great as to give up her own ambitions to settle with him. She subtly claimed he had been worth it, and Dally was glad she thought so though it didn't make the sting of her right hook any sweeter when he would parade it over her head. But then, they both supposed their children were worth anything and more.
He looked at the second born now, this child that he helped bring into this world, and felt a staggering surge of love and affection. It felt foreign, like a warm gush cracking and bursting open like an egg inside his chest. Ol' Tim would've laughed his ass off at the sight of the sourest hood on the block with a baby girl swaddled carefully in his arms but Dallas would have had him six feet in the ground if he had anything to say about it.
