She Fears Love

Five | Curious But Cautious

Sebastian

Aleah walked past Nathan and I to walk out the front door to take the call she was getting, muttering a quick apology before shutting the door. She wasn't covering her screen, and curiosity won the best of me as I looked down and saw Sperm Donator was lighting up her screen.

Once the door was shut, I let out the snort I was holding in and played it off by rubbing a finger under my nose when Nathan raised a brow at me.

"Allergies."

"Mm."

Baby Brit took hold of my hand and dragged me up the stairs and into her room, leaving her brother to get himself a snack in the kitchen. Without me. Good thing I had already eaten a protein bar before coming. Though, I was already getting hungry again.

Having to eat a snack every hour was kind of annoying, but it was a given with how much I worked out. It was my therapy. And I wasn't going to give up on the only thing keeping me sane.

"Can you help me?" Brit looked up at me with her big brown eyes, looking like a sad puppy. Those eyes were the reason I went broke immediately after getting a check.

"Of course, princess." I knelt down to her level. "What do you need help with?"

"A letter for Aleah."

I nodded, watching her gather up some of the materials she wanted to use for said letter.

"Letter? For what?"

She frowned for a second, remembering something. "I want to say it's okay to be sad. Mommy and Nathan get sad too. And that I don't want her to leave me again."

"Sad?" The girl out there showed no sign of sadness. She looked like the life of the party if anything.

"Mhm." She dropped one of the crayons and I picked it up for her, setting it on her little working table. "You get sad sometimes too."

I snapped my eyes up at her and tried my best to hold back my own frown. The way this little girl read people was quite scary. I've never shown I was sad in front of her. I guessed kids could sense vibes.

But still.

I didn't appreciate getting read like an open book by a five year old. Especially when I tried really hard to hide any of my true feelings.

"I'm not sad, Brit," I forced a chuckle, yet the second it came out I knew it wasn't believable.

She narrowed her eyes at me, then shrugged to give me my way. "Okay."

I hate it here.

"I just don't know how to spell yet. I need help writing it."

I stretched my hand as I sat my ass down on the ground in front of her table. "I don't have the best handwriting."

"That's okay."

• • •

"Hey, man, you good?" Ryan waved a hand in front of me as he handed me another beer. "You've been dozing off half the night already."

I blinked my thoughts away and tilted my head back to chug the whole beer down. "I'm good. Just a bit stressed about work." Not a full lie.

Truth was, I couldn't stop thinking about Aleah. Not because I was interested in her. Never that. But because I watched Brit hand her the letter I wrote for her. She read it in front of me. And she knew I was the one who wrote it.