Crazy In Love (Anthony Rizzo)

Beach Day

Melissa

"Where are we going to today mommy" Mallory asks as she holds my hand. Her little dress shoes clink on top the concrete as she skips down the streets of Chicago without a concern in the world. Her little purple dress flapping in the wind as the bow in her hair hangs on for dear life.

"How about we go to the pier" I ask and she lights up.

"Can we get churros" she asks.

"Of course baby girl" I assure her as I cup her chin. She looks up at me and I am reminded that I would do anything for this little girl.

We get to the pier and get our sugar sticks filled with pudding. My camera hangs around my neck as I wait for something worth capturing on a camera. I snap some pictures of Mallory eating her churro and her trying to feel a seagull. After we have our snack we head to the docks. I take pictures of the city and the Ferris wheel, iconic Chicago things. I've only been here for five years so I was still fairly knew to the city.

Eventually we go out to the beach and Mallory puts on a pink bikini swim suit. She goes into the water and splashes around under the sun. I continue to take pictures because I was still on the job. I had no photo shoots today, which is rare, but I still needed pictures to turn in for inventory.

"Mommy look" Mallory yells as she jumps into a wave. I take a few pictures of her before she comes crawling out of the lake.

She sits on her towel next to mine and I wrap another towel around her. I put some more sun screen on her exposed skin as she drinks water like a good little girl.

"Are you having fun" I ask as I finish cleaning up her face from excess sun screen.

"I always have fun with you mommy" she smiles up to me and I smile back.

"That's good" I admit. I hand her a sandwich and some grapes which she chomps on. I watch her eat before finally saying what I needed to say.

"So you know how I went on that date the other day" I start.

"Yeah" she says before taking another bite of her sandwich.

"Well it went really well. So well... that he wants to meet you" I say and she turns to me.

"Is he cute" she asks and I laugh.

"Very cute. And he even plays for a living" I say and her eyes grow big.

"Woah, that's so cool" she claims and I nod.

"He's pretty great. And he wants us to come watch him play... if that's okay with you" I say slowly. She turns to me with her big blue eyes and it makes me nervous. Because as much as I like Anthony, if she doesn't like him I don't see... whatever this is... going very far.

"Can I wear a bow to watch him play" she asks.

"I'll make you a extra special bow" I assure her.

"Okay! Then I want to go" she claims and I smile. "Is uncle Tim coming too" she wonders.

"If he is feeling up to it he is more than welcome to join us. But he just got his treatment done and might not feel strong enough" I try to explain. She kind of knows what is going on with him but she's young, this is a topic that is hard for her to wrap her mind around. She doesn't understand why uncle Tim lost his hair or why he gets sick. She doesn't get why he has to stay in the hospital sometimes or why he can't work like mommy. But he's been in chemo for almost a year now. He's on his third different type of treatment and all it has done was stop it from getting worse. Which in retrospect is pretty nice, but he wanted to get better. He probably doesn't want to live with me and my crazy daughter his whole life but he couldn't live on his own yet. Physically and financially it was a bad idea.

"I hope he feels better soon" she says.

"Yeah baby girl, me too."

After we finish up lunch on the beach I get her dressed once again and we start to head back into town. We go into Michigan Avenue and go into some stores. We look around but we don't buy anything because heaven knows I can't afford it.

We walk around and I stop when I see the Chicago Cubs section of Macy's. The place was filled with Anthony's jerseys and socks and other stuff. I had no idea he was such a big deal. I mean, out of the three guys from that team I know of he is one of them, but he was practically worshiped here.

"What are you looking at mommy" Mallory asks.

"You see that guy standing right there" I ask her pointing to a cut out of Anthony hitting a baseball.

"Yeah" she says.

"That's the boy mommy is dating" I explain.

"He doesn't look too good" she whispers and I laugh.

"That's not actually him, that's just a picture of him" I explain.

"Ohhhh" she gasps causing me to giggle. I wish I was still that innocent. "When do I get to meet the real him" she asks.

"Pretty soon" I sigh. I'm not sure I'm ready for this.

"What is he like" she asks and I stop over thinking for a second to smile.

"He's really funny, he always makes me laugh. He had cancer like Uncle Tim does and he got all better so he could play again. He has curly hair like yours, but his is brown. He's so sweet and kind and is quite the charmer" I admit.

"Is he going to replace daddy" she asks and I sigh.

"No. But he can make both of us happy if things turn out good. Maybe we can have a family and things will start looking up for us" I insist.

"But I like how we are right now" she claims as she squeezes my hand.

"I do too. But sometimes I want more. Its like ice cream. Sure, vanilla ice cream is good. But with whipped cream and chocolate chips and caramel it's better, right" I ask.

"I do like caramel" she cheers.

"Well right now our life is the ice cream and Anthony is the toppings" I explain and she nods her little head.

"That makes sense" she claims.

"Good, now lets get home. We got bows to make" I insist.

We go home and I let her pick out some ribbon. Ever since she was a baby I've made her bows to put in her hair, she loves them. Sometimes they're like full sized cheer bows, but usually she does the smaller clip on bow.

She picks out blue and red and white to go with her outfit she had picked out for the game tomorrow even though I'm sure it will change at least a dozen times before then. I quickly make her bow and add sparkles because she won't wear it unless it had sparkles. Finally it was ready... but I wasn't sure I was.