Zac's POV
I knew we were pushing our luck.
The sun was barely up, and we were sitting at Aunt Mae's kitchen table, sipping on her strong-as-hell coffee and trying to act like we didn't do exactly what we did last night. Fatima looked like peace wrapped in a bonnet and my hoodie, still barefoot and sleepy-eyed, leaning her head on my shoulder like we hadn't snuck around like teenagers hours earlier.
Aunt Mae placed a plate of biscuits in front of us, humming a hymn under her breath. She wiped her hands on a towel, looked at me with that same look she gave me when I was ten and broke her glass angel, and said, "You think I don't know she snuck into your room last night?"
Fatima damn near choked on her orange juice. I just stared at Aunt Mae, trying to keep my cool.
"Auntie..." I started.
She cut her eyes at me and kept it moving toward the fridge. "Zachary, I may be old, but I'm not blind. I saw her tiptoeing across that hallway like I wasn't gon' hear them floorboards creaking."
Fatima covered her face with both hands. I looked at her and smirked.
"I told you to be quiet," I mumbled under my breath, nudging her thigh with mine under the table.
She peeked at me through her fingers and mouthed, "Shut up."
Aunt Mae just shook her head and let out a little chuckle. "Lord have mercy, y'all lucky I love you. And that y'all leavin' today before I gotta bless that whole guest room with oil."
We both laughed but tried to hide it behind sips of coffee.
"You better marry that girl soon," Aunt Mae added, pointing at me with the syrup bottle. "She already yours in every way that matters. Don't make me come out to LA and chase you down."
"Yes, ma'am," I said, stealing a quick glance at Fatima, who was blushing so hard her ears were red.
We finished breakfast in silence after that—well, silence if you don't count Fatima kicking me under the table every time Aunt Mae left the room.
....
If I wasn't already tired from sneaking around my great aunt's house with my fiancée like we were in high school again, my three-year-old daughter made sure I was fully exhausted by the time we got to the airport.
"Kolby, baby, come on. We gotta go home," I said, trying to wrangle her little pink unicorn backpack over her shoulder while Fatima checked our boarding passes at security.
"Nooo!" she cried, tears already welling up in her big brown eyes. "I don't wanna go! I wanna stay wif those other kids!"
Fatima shot me a look that said, "Good luck," and kept walking toward the gate while I tried to reason with a toddler who acted like I just told her Bluey got canceled.
"Baby, we gotta get on the plane so we can go home. You'll see your cousins again real soon."
She crossed her arms and puffed her cheeks out. "You da one said we gotta leave," she huffed. "You da reason I can't pway no more!"
So now I was the bad guy.
"Really?" I asked, crouching down to her level. "I'm the reason?"
She nodded her head so hard her puffballs bounced. "Yup. You say we gotta get on da 'airplane' and I don't wanna! It's YOUR fault, Daddy!"
Fatima turned around, barely holding back a laugh as she watched the scene unfold. She mouthed, "Told you," before walking ahead, leaving me and the tiny traitor behind.
