Bugs Bite

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: Oh, The Haunt

'Honey,' Avish whispered to his daughter - his beautiful, winsome daughter - stroking her curly long hair and clearing all thatches he found in there. She was sitting on his lap, even though she said she was too much of a "big girl" for that.

'Daddy,' Radha said. In her sweet, saccharine voice.

'Do you think I'm a bad person?' Avish asked her.

She frowned at him, a frown as innocent as her hands and her eyes - oh, she had her mother's eyes, brown, brown and true as wet, fertile soil - and everything else about her. She leaned in closer towards him and sniffed adorably. 'Daddy, you smell.'

Avish backed off his mouth against the rock-chair.

'You're drunk again, aren't you, Daddy?'

Avish stared at her. 'You didn't answer my question.'

And I'm not going to answer yours.

Radha's face lit up. 'Mommy says you're not a Bad Person. She says you just sometimes do Bad Things, but you don't mean them.'

Avish sighed. 'Mommy says a lot of things, honey . . .'

'Was that the right answer, Daddy?'

'Yes, honey.' He kissed her forehead and realized she was shrinking away from him, but was too polite to say anything; just because he was used to the stink of booze, doesn't mean everyone was. 'That's the right answer, honey.'

Ah, Preeti. You always know what to do, don't you? And I have been such a git, haven't I? You know how to deal with children, I don't. You know when to stop a quarrel, I don't. You know what's good for you, me, Radha, everyone. You know what we should do. What we mustn't. I don't. Although I know that you know what to say every time, you still don't say anything when I lose it and raise my hand at you. How can you be so peerless and I be so -

'Daddy?'

'Yes, honey?'

'You just bumped your head against mine. What happened?'

'Oh, did I? I'm sorry, honey. Daddy was thinking. Does it hurt?'

Radha cutely rubbed her temples and said with a sly smirk: 'Little.'

Avish sighed and cleared his throat. Then in his best, deep-throat voice, while bringing up a jittering hand, he growled: 'Well, not to fear, for the giggling hand is here!'

Radha loved her tickles. She absolutely, madly loved the giggling hand. And he loved to see her laugh.

'But you didn't really answer the question, honey,' he then said.

'Huh?'

'I asked you if you thought I was a bad person, not Mommy.'

'Oh.' She fiddled nervously with her braids.

'Just say it, honey. I promise I won't say anything.'

'Okay, I guess. Well, sometimes, when you and Mommy fight, I get scared. You say Bad Things to her. And then I think you are Bad. But otherwise I think you're a really good Dad.'

'Really?' His voiced cracked. Tears brewed up behind his sockets. Suddenly he was this little kid again. Or at least, he wanted to be.

Adults can't cry, not the way kids can.

'Daddy, are you crying?'

What would Preeti do in a situation like this? Think, godammit, don't scar your child! What would Preeti do? What would your wife do - ?!