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for a
dad. Despite a great night with a bad man, I was going to end up using a
honky-tonk sperm donor one day.
    “Can I come?”
Sawyer asked, appearing from the yard.
    “We don’t know
where we’re going.”
    “I don’t care.
Tuck is bringing the baby over. It’ll cry and everyone will pay attention to it
and ignore me.”
    “I know the
feeling of being replaced,” Bailey said, smirking at her sister. “Little kids
suck.”
    Sawyer rolled
her eyes and looked at me. “Can I come?”
    “What do you
want to do?”
    “We could barhop
and scope out hot guys.”
    I frowned at
Bailey who shrugged. “I didn’t teach her that.”
    “A girls’ night
out sounds great. We’ll clean up and meet in an hour. We can pick up my car
before we come home.”
    After Sawyer
high-fived me followed by her sister, she ran inside to announce in the loudest
voice imaginable how she was ditching the baby stank for the night.
    A grumpy Bailey
nudged me. “You better not ignore me and pay attention to her.”
    “I can pay
attention to both of you. I had two little siblings, remember?”
    Bailey’s frown
faded and she hugged me. “Your life makes me sad.”
    Hugging her back,
I shrugged off her worry. Bailey wasn’t convinced though.
    “I wish I could
hit you over the head and give you amnesia, so you’d forget all the bad stuff
that happened to you.”
    “I like
remembering who I am.”
    “What if I hit
you just kinda hard and gave you a little bit of amnesia?” she suggested,
grinning.
    “With my luck, I’d
just remember the crap and forget the good stuff.”
    “What good stuff?”
    “Lark and Phoenix,” I said, walking away. “Oh and the fucking from last night was pretty memorable.”
    “Whore.”
    Giving her a
wink, I disappeared down the path to the apartment. A night with the girls
would distract from Vaughn. I wanted to smack him for the stupid text. I also
wanted another night of sweaty fun. Smacking and sexing would have to wait. The
Johansson sisters required all of my attention.
    Twenty minutes
later, Bailey was shocked when Sawyer won Rock, Paper, Scissors then chose
Chuck E Cheese as our hangout destination. Sawyer was shocked anyone wouldn’t
want to go to Chuck E Cheese. I was just shocked the sisters hadn’t killed each
other years ago.
    A deal was a
deal, so we dropped by Chuck E Cheese. Even though I promised Bailey we would
eat somewhere, she sulked like a bitchy child. I eventually said I was ignoring
her unless she played nice.
    Grudgingly, oh
so very grudgingly, Bailey chilled out. Arms crossed in irritation, she watched
Sawyer and I play the Aliens game. Duckface present, she stood next to
me and Sawyer while we rode the roller coaster simulator. By the time I was
throwing basketballs, Bailey finally realized there was no harm in silly fun.
    When we were
crawling around in the tubes with Sawyer, Bailey laughed before quickly looking
around to make sure no one knew she was having fun. In that moment, I realized
her biggest problem. Bailey lived her life through the eyes of others.
    Despite her big
mouth and claims of awesome, she wasn’t her own person. Everything she did was
to gain the approval of others, but people were impossible to please. I wished
she understood how out of a hundred people, she would still have at least one
hater. I realized this fact as a kid when one grandmother told me I looked like
an angel before another grandmother told me I looked like trailer trash. There
was no pleasing everyone, so life had to be about what I needed and how to
please those I loved. Anyone beyond them was static.
    Telling Bailey
any of this would feel like a lecture and she was in a good mood once she
realized Chuck E Cheese was empty enough for her to enjoy. We bought a hundred
tokens and played crappy games until they were all gone. Next, Sawyer danced
with the Chuck E Cheese animatronic
mouse while I took pictures. Soon, I joined her and shook my butt to the
horrible music.
    When Bailey
seemed