Gorgeous Nightmare

“So did you look into the adoption thing today?” Craig asked while I sat at home waiting for Lily to return.

“Yeah, they said they gotta do a background check on me and find out more about her.” I explained what they told me as I took a sip of my beer.

“How longs that going to take?” I shrugged.

“She said maybe a day or two.” He nodded at my answer.

“You excited?” He smiled and I shrugged.

“A little,” I chuckled.

“A little? Dude you’re gonna be a dad!” Craig exclaimed.

“She’s been with me for over a year now, not that much of a change.”

“Yeah true, it’s kind of like a couple that’s lived together for years and already having kids finally getting married, won’t change anything but her last name.”

“Yeah but Lily’s already known as Ortiz, now it’ll be legal.” I chuckled.

“Think it’ll be hard?” He asked turning serious.

I sighed looking down; honestly I did a little bit. I mean I’m a rock star, I tour and work all the time, this was the first break I had in a while and that’s why it took this long to legally adopt Lily.

“I’ve had her for a year and she’s doing better here than she had with her real parents in 15 years, why wouldn’t they let me adopt her?” I said with fake confidence.

“Yeah where’s her dad anyway? I never asked…”

“She said he died when she was 13.” I explained and he nodded.

She never really spoke of him other than telling me he’s dead.

I remember once when I had asked.

Lily looked down at her textbook; she was in my room for some reason.

“Why are you in here?” I chuckled and she looked up at me with a smile and shrug.

“Bored, wanna bug you.” I chuckled at her answer.

I suddenly looked down becoming serious.

“Lily, tell me about your dad.” She turned visibly tense.

Since she got here I noticed little by little she showed her emotions, she was keeping her promise not to lie. She didn’t even try and hide her emotions anymore. Always told me the littlest of things like if she didn’t do her homework like expected or when she stayed up a little passed bedtime with Max watching TV or something.

The confessions were stupid and minor but it made us both feel better when she admitted them.

“What about him?”

“I don’t know, what was he like?” I tried again.

“He was rarely around, nothing special. He lived, had me, and died.” She kept looking at her textbook even though I could tell she wasn’t reading.

I had wanted to know so I could tell if I acted like him or better, I wanted to be better for her then she had had before.

“Lily,” I sighed.

“Rob, can we not talk about him?” I froze; she hasn’t called me by name in a while.

It was dad by now and when she did call me by my name it was always Rob not Robert, I don’t know why she shortened it but she was the only one allowed to. She only called me Rob when she was upset with me.

I nodded afraid to go further with the subject.

Maybe the background check the adoption agency is doing will tell me more about him.