troublewillfindme

Generally, they avoid the princess movies. He’d rather not raise his daughter to believe she has to sit around, waiting to be rescued, even if their current situation makes that very scenario a real possibility.

He does not think about the van parked on the street, about the way it has not moved all day. He does not think about the eerily similar one parked a few blocks from Sally’s school when he’d gone to pick her up at the end of the day.

“I’ll handle it,” Jack had said. “You take care of your daughter.”

So, he did. He’d carried her into the pizza place with him, setting her on the counter as he paid. He’d carried her into the grocery store where he’d picked up and paid for a half-gallon of ice cream without her once leaving his arms.

They’d driven straight from there to Jack’s; he’d let them in and promptly locked the door behind.

Sally hadn’t seemed to have noticed anything was amiss.

Truth be told, she still seems blissfully unaware, sated on pizza and ice cream, and attention squarely on the movie playing out before them.

Anya is spunky and determined, quick with a quip and determined to avoid the fate laid out before her. The love story is cute, and manages a genuine chemistry despite taking place in a children’s movie.

There’s even a dog.

Who helps save the day.

Alright, he might really be enjoying this.

The princess smashes the vial, crushing it under her heel, the man who destroyed her family torn apart by the very evil he’d so carefully cultivated. The last surviving Romanov stands victorious, battered and disheveled but finally free.

It’s a feeling he can appreciate.

Dmitri comes to in time to all but confess his love when the dog returns, tiara in mouth. Anya dashes off a note to her grandmother before eloping, celebrating their victory on a cruise along the Seine.

“What’d you think?” He asks his daughter as the credits roll.

She chatters away excitedly, obviously pleased with the choice in film. She has questions, of course, about the fall of the Romanovs, about why Anya didn’t remember her family, about why any one would ever voluntarily go out on a boat.

He answers them all to the best of his ability, trying to distill certain concepts down into a more kid friendly version. She nods, taking it all in, then in typical Sally fashion, manages to stun him:

“Can we get a bat?”

He blinks, wondering if he’s really heard her correctly. “A … bat?”

“Yeah,” she nods. “Like Bartok.”

He watches Jack cover his mouth, trying to hide his smile. The message is clear: You’re on your own for this one, Will.

“They’re not … they’re not pets, kiddo.”

“Why not?”

In general, Sally has not come to accept the concept of a wild animal. She understands it, certainly, but doesn’t seem to believe the fact that some animals are not meant to be pet, and are not looking to be befriended. No number of explanations have convinced her; he is only glad Tacoma’s local fauna are generally of little interest to her.

“They … don’t want to live in a house. They want to live in trees. Stellaluna didn’t live in a house.”

“But that wasn’t good. She lost her mom.”

“They wouldn’t like all the lights on all the time.”

She considers this. “But we could keep the lights off?”

He shakes his head. Reason be damned, he’ll have to handle this the only way he knows how. “Jane would be sad. Do you want her to be sad?”

Sally’s face falls. “No.”

“Me either. That’s why we can’t have a pet bat.”

–

They spend the night at Jack’s as a precaution, spare clothes and toothbrushes already there.

Sally curls up in his arms, the rise and fall of her chest evening out as she drifts off, damp hair braided back to keep it off her face. It’s a quiet night, and she makes it through without waking.

Will wishes he could say the same.

–

True to his word, Jack handles whatever party is responsible for the vans, listed in the police blotter as two abandoned vehicles.

–

He doesn’t think much of their conversation. Sally’s affinity for animals is nothing new.

Some weeks later, though, he finds her standing on tiptoe at her window, lights off and curtains back.

“Sally?” He asks. “What are you looking at, kiddo?”

“Come here!” She gushes. “Look!”

He does as he’s asked, pausing briefly to pick her up.

“What am I looking at?”

She gestures out towards the branches of the nearby tree. “Friends!”

Sure enough, there’s a small colony of bats resting from the branch.