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Nicky rolled over in Joe’s loose grip on a quiet Saturday morning and relished the ability to watch his husband sleep. Sure, this exact scene had played out hundreds of times over the course of their relationship, but it had been unusually rare for the last few months, and he missed it.
Joe had been commissioned to create art for a fancy boutique hotel and significantly overcommitted on a short deadline.
The stress of finishing several pieces at once wore him down, with Nicky waking up on more than one occasion to find Joe still working in his studio, distracted and disheveled, having stayed up all night. Finally though, the last canvases were done, and all that was left to do was wait for the thick layers of oil paint to dry before they could be delivered and installed.
As Nicky debated the best way to sneak out of Joe’s arms and leave him to rest a bit longer, their bedroom door burst open.
“Daddy! Baba!” Amira ran over to their bed and climbed up, knobby knees and elbows digging into Nicky as she wedged herself between her fathers.
“Daddy,” she rolled over to face him. “Can we have – can I – can we have crepes for breakfast?” she asked, breathless and tripping over her words in anticipation, as though Nicky did not regularly give in to this exact request. “Please,” she tacked on as an afterthought.
Nicky always imagined that, when he had children, they would call him Papa, like he called his father. But for a while, Amira’s P’s and B’s sounded very similar. After one too many times of going to see what Amira wanted only to have her react with displeasure and realize she was calling for Joe… well, he’d decided to go by Daddy instead.
Half asleep, Joe grumbled at the disruption and rolled over, burrowing deeper into the blankets.
“Shh patatina,” Nicky said, wrapping an arm around her waist and pulling her towards him. “Let’s let Baba get some rest; I’ll make breakfast.”
Not satisfied without Joe’s attention, Amira wriggled out from under Nicky’s arm and crawled over to him.
“Baba,” she whisper-shouted right in his ear.
“Amira,” Nicky sighed in exasperation. There was no denying Joe was her favorite. Working freelance and on commission, he was home a lot more with her than Nicky was. But even without that, Joe was exuberant and fun, silly and creative. It came naturally to him. Nicky would spend hours reading parenting forums on how to get your kids involved in chores only for his detailed chore wheel to end up useless and in the trash. Meanwhile Joe would spontaneously challenge Amira to a competition to see who could pick up the most toys, or make up a song for how to help set the table, and she’d go along without complaint. There was no real comparison.
“Baba!” Amira tried again, pulling Joe’s hair just to be a pest.
“Bess Baba,” Joe groaned, rolling over to face her. Despite his exhaustion, and Amira’s deliberately annoying behavior, Joe was already smiling.
Nicky reached an arm across Amira to rub at Joe’s scalp where she’d tugged at it. He was overdue for a haircut, and his beard was beginning to look unkempt and wiry from the lack of grooming. In their prior, childless life, he might’ve kept Joe in bed all day on a day like this, fooling around and catching up on sleep. But that was definitely no longer on the day’s agenda, and instead he settled for running his hand down to smooth over the rough bristles on Joe’s jaw.
“What do you think,” Nicky asked. “Will crepes do for a celebratory breakfast?”
Joe hummed in agreement, turned to press a kiss to the inside of Nicky’s wrist, then scooted closer and threw an arm around Nicky’s waist, exaggeratedly flopping his arm across Amira so that she was trapped under both their arms. Sandwiched between them, Amira squealed in pretend protest before snuggling down. Joe’s eyes closed once more, stealing sleep where he could, and Nicky enjoyed the few minutes of peace before Amira inevitably became restless.
***
After a sticky and nutritiously dubious breakfast of Nutella crepes, Joe decided to take a nap while Amira played upstairs. Nicky was taking advantage of the quiet to do the crossword on his laptop when he heard Joe gasp and yell, “Amira!”
The tone in Joe’s voice gave him pause. Both of them were certainly guilty of snapping at Amira when she tested their patience, but he had never heard Joe shout her name with this much anger.
Nicky abandoned his laptop on the coffee table and went upstairs to find the pair of them in Joe’s studio, Amira trying to hide behind the legs of Joe’s easel, her hands, shirt, and patches of the carpet around her covered in thick globs of paint. One of the canvases Joe had left to dry overnight lay tipped face down onto the floor. Another lay face up but was visibly smeared with blotches of paint and child sized handprints.
Nicky held his breath as Joe bent down to pick up the overturned canvas, hoping to see it intact. Joe slowly turned it over to reveal the paint had not fully set, and it too was now smeared and damaged.
He let go of the canvas, and it dropped back to the ground, clattering in the stillness of the room. Before Nicky could think of what to do to break the tension, Joe slammed his hand down against a table in frustration, making both he and Amira jump.
“How many times have I said no playing in here!” Joe rounded on Amira who burst into tears and bolted across the room, throwing herself at Nicky in the doorway. He picked her up, heedless of the paint he was now guaranteed to be covered in, and shushed her as he held her close.
“Joe –” he attempted to soothe, but Joe cut him off.
“This took me weeks! I can’t just fix this overnight! I’m going to blow the deadline now; you realize that right?” His voice was frantic. He turned towards Nicky, and in a fit of pique, kicked one of his damaged canvases.
Amira continued to cry and shriek in Nicky’s arms, burying her face against his shoulder and fisting her paint covered hands against his shirt.
Joe wasn’t wrong; he had worked very hard on all the pieces. These two in particular had required multiple coats of paint, each which took hours to fully set before he could continue working. It was a serious set back, and Nicky didn’t know nearly enough about art to brainstorm how to fix it.
“They paid me half upfront, Nicky,” Joe continued, tapping his fist into the palm of his hand in agitation. “You know damn well we don’t have that money to return.”
Joe was right about that too; they’d used it to update their old and dated kitchen. If they had to give the money back, it would mean dipping into savings, which would be hard. Nicky couldn’t actually tell how likely an outcome that was; he suspected Joe was catastrophizing, but either way, nothing good would come of talking about this now.
“Joe,” he tried to pacify over the sound of Amira’s wails. “We’ll figure it out. Why don’t we all just…take a break.”
Joe’s anger had always burned hot but flamed out quickly. Nicky could already see those emotions starting to turn inward; Joe’s shoulders slumping in defeat, his face creasing in pain instead of fury. It made Nicky’s heart break. He wanted to pull him into his arms and hold him and convince him things would be ok.
But this was the tradeoff they’d made when they had decided to be parents, and he couldn’t do any of those things holding their screaming daughter. One problem at a time.
“Why don’t you take a walk. Or maybe you could...” He cast around for something that would seem enticing instead of a brush off. “Watch…” He couldn’t remember who or what might be playing today. “Sports?” he concluded lamely, raising his voice to be heard over Amira’s continued piercing wails which seemed to be increasing in pitch the longer she was ignored. Joe stared in disbelief.
Nicky didn’t blame him; it was an inane suggestion, but he also couldn't think of what else to do besides suggest Joe take a moment to himself while Nicky got a handle on at least one part of this situation. Amira had started kicking her feet against him, and he grunted as she got a particularly good jab into his stomach. With one last look at Joe in which he tried to convey that he loved him and everything would work itself out and please don’t be mad – which frankly was asking a lot from one look – he turned and carried Amira to the hall bathroom.
“I just wanted to pa-ai-aint,” she wailed, her words fractured by large, gulping sobs.
“I know, I know,” Nicky soothed. “But Baba keeps important work in there; you know you’re not supposed to go in by yourself.”
Amira continued crying, not acknowledging a word he said, and Nicky abandoned the attempt at a lecture in favor of more practical concerns.
He moved to set her down on the counter, but the attempt at separation only made her cling harder, twining her legs around his waist as best she could reach.
“Come on, Amira, be a big girl now,” he tried, but she was having none of it.
“Ok fine,” he relented, leaning forward to hold her over the sink instead. “But we have to wash your hands off.”
Amira fought him near every step of the way, tiny hands clenched into fists, crying continuing uninterrupted. Eventually he managed to wash off the worst of the paint and strip her of her stained shirt. Deeming it a lost cause, he dropped it straight in the trash, then did the same with his own, neither piece worth the effort of removing this kind of stain.
By the time he was done, Nicky began to worry about just how hard and how long she had been crying. Amira’s face was blotchy red and streaked with tears, her breath coming out in gasping pants. At this rate, she’d make herself sick. On any other day, he’d go get Joe, who had an incredible aptitude for distracting Amira and avoiding meltdowns. When Joe took her to doctor’s appointments, nurses complimented them on how well behaved she was. The one time Nicky took her alone to get a shot, she screamed so loud the children in the waiting room looked absolutely terrified as they left. But calling in Joe for backup was probably not on the table at the moment.
Nicky picked Amira back up and walked down the hall to her room, noting the house seemed quiet; maybe Joe had taken his suggestion and gone out.
He reached Amira’s room and bounced her a couple times on his hip to get her attention.
“Here, amore.” He grabbed her favorite stuffed animal off her bed, a well loved orange tabby cat that Amira had imaginatively named Cat. “Do you want this?” He waved it in front of her.
Amira’s wails quieted a bit, and she hiccuped before mournfully nodding and pulling Cat against her face. She turned to burrow as best she could into his bare chest, and Nicky let out a sigh of relief that she finally seemed to be calming down.
Deciding the house was warm enough and clothes were overrated, he carried her to the living room. By the time he sat them both on the couch and put Frozen on tv, she was quiet besides the occasional sniffle.
He pulled out his phone and shot Joe a text asking if he’d gone out.
Amira gradually uncurled, peaking watery eyes out from behind Cat to watch the screen, the allure of her favorite movie too strong to resist, just as Nicky had hoped. He swiped a thumb under eyes to brush away tears.
The stress of the day was starting to catch up with him too, and as soon as Amira shifted off his lap to sit by herself on the couch, he tipped over to lie down, head on a pillow next to the armrest.
Moments later, Amira crawled over him to lie behind him, snug against his back.
Nicky wondered if she was deliberately mimicking Joe’s preferred comfort position – wedged between Nicky and any other surface – or if this was a coincidence.
“Patatina,” he said, craning his head over his shoulder to look at her. “Can you see Elsa like that? Why don’t you come lay here?” He patted the cushions in front of him to entice her forward, but she shook her head then pressed her face into his back. Still upset then.
“Ok amore,” Nicky conceded. “You can stay back there until you’re ready.”
When Elsa’s big song came on, and Amira still hadn’t crawled out from behind him, Nicky started to worry. He turned to check on her only to find she had fallen asleep. He tugged a throw blanket from over the back of the couch across them, rolled over and, curling protectively around her, decided to nap too.
***
The afternoon wore on, and Joe remained absent; Nicky’s text, unanswered. He’d finally given in to worry and texted a few of their close friends to see if they’d heard from Joe. To Nicky’s relief, Booker confirmed Joe was with him. Booker’s idea of cheering someone up usually involved copious amounts of alcohol, but at least Joe wasn’t out wandering upset and alone.
In the meantime, Amira was being unusually demanding of his attention. In the absence of other plans, Nicky preferred to use Saturdays to get things set up for the week and leave Sundays free to relax. But he’d only barely managed to color sort their laundry before Amira had decided to roll around in the piles, and he’d given up the endeavor as a lost cause.
Instead he was now sitting on the floor in her bedroom, helping her organize her stuffed animals into categories beyond his comprehension and listening to her babble about their various backstories, many of them surprisingly dark for such a small child.
Nicky waited for a pause in her narration before interjecting, “Ok Amira, it’s time for me to start dinner.” He stood up and stretched; his body was not meant to sit on the floor for so long anymore. “Do you want to watch TV downstairs? We could put Elsa back on?”
“No! Wait! No,” Amira popped up and threw herself around his legs, gripping tight. “I can help.” She looked up at him plaintively.
He stroked her messy curls back over her forehead. Truth be told, he wouldn’t mind a little alone time cooking.
“It won’t be very fun for you. You have to be careful; no flinging yourself about the room. And it can be tricky when you’re working with knives. Or a hot stove.”
“But I can help,” she insisted again. “I'm very smart,” she tried when he didn’t immediately come back with a response.
Any desire to further dissuade her left him at once.
“Of course you are patatina, of course. So smart.” He started to sigh then coughed to hide that he had done so.
“Let’s go downstairs and see what we can make.” He took her hand in his, and they made their way to the kitchen.
Once there, Nicky surveyed the pantry and fridge for ingredient inspiration. He looked back at Amira standing behind him, twisting back and forth, already restless, and tried to think of something easy she could help with. Inspiration suddenly struck.
“When I was only a little bit older than you, my nonna taught me how to make pasta by hand. Do you want to learn?”
“Yes!” She jumped in the air before stilling, pulling the hem of her shirt down as though pretending she had always been patient and still.
With a fond smile, he shook his head, then went about getting them set up, using clothespins to cover Amira in dishtowels as a makeshift apron and cleaning off the counter for a work surface. As an afterthought, he pulled out his phone and put his Spotify on shuffle, starting with Luigi Tenco and letting the app make a playlist of exactly the kind of music his grandmother used to play while they cooked together.
Amira climbed onto a stool in front of a clean countertop, and Nicky began explaining the process for making pasta. To his relief, Amira was engaged and attentive, doing her best to help crack the eggs into the well of flour, mixing and kneading as best she could with her small hands.
As the ingredients began to resolve themselves into a malleable dough, Nicky tried to remember the last time he had spent this much uninterrupted time with Amira alone and found he couldn’t. Maybe it had been back when Amira was tiny, too small to really engage with?
After several minutes of kneading, it was finally time to let the dough rest. Nicky shaped the dough into a ball, covered it in plastic wrap, and set it aside. Amira hopped off her stool and Nicky set about cleaning up their work station.
“We’ll let the dough rest, and then we’ll cut it into noodles,” Nicky explained. “Do you still want to help with that part?” he asked.
“Mmhmm,” Amira nodded her head in exaggerated, wide arcs. “And then eat them with butter?” she asked.
“Sure, we can eat them with butter,” he conceded. For all he and Joe had exposed her to a wide array of diverse cuisines, her palate was just as unsophisticated as most of her peers.
A more upbeat song gave way to gentle sixties pop as Dalida’s cover of Parlez-Moi d’Amour began to play. He smiled down at his darling daughter, feeling fond and indulgent like he always did when this song came on.
“You know Baba and I danced to this song at our wedding?” He rinsed and dried his hands off on a towel, then wet a washcloth to wipe Amira down.
“You did?” she asked, bright eyed and curious like she sometimes got at the idea that her parents had ever had a life she didn’t know about. She held her hands out without complaint, chubby fingers stretched wide as he crouched down in front of her. Nicky diligently swiped between each finger and scrubbed at her nails before brushing away the flour which, despite his attempt at an apron, she had absolutely coated herself with. A fair trade; extra laundry was worth this afternoon.
“We did. My nonna, the one who taught me how to make pasta, loved this song, and it turned out Baba’s grandmother did too. So we decided to dance to it.” He stroked Amira’s curls back from her forehead before wiping off the last bit of flour she’d managed to rub near her hairline.
Deciding she was as clean as she’d get without a bath, Nicky raised himself from a crouch to toss the washcloth in the sink. His knees popped as he stood, and for a moment he wanted to be sad that he was already so far from being the little boy who needed to stand on a stool to work at the counter with his grandmother, or even from that young man who’d just gotten to marry the love of his life. But then Amira leaned to rest her head against his thigh, and he couldn’t bring himself to lament being anywhere but right there.
“How?” she asked.
Nicky laughed at the unexpected rejoinder. “How did we dance?” he clarified.
“Yeah.” She punctuated the question with a bounce.
“Hmm,” Nicky mused. “I suppose we began like this.”
He scooped her up, lifting her a bit higher than necessary to hear her laugh before settling her on his hip. He took her hand in his, so small his wide palm completely engulfed it. He held their joined hands out to the side in an imitation of the more formal dance hold he and Joe had attempted for about half of the song. They had planned some real choreography, with a twirl and even a dip, but had ended the song wrapped up in each other, all attempts at professionalism or showmanship dropped.
A key sounded in the lock of the front door, and Nicky and Amira turned in tandem towards it. Joe kept his back to them as he closed the door and locked it behind him, his posture a little sheepish, perhaps worried about his reception. He finally looked up to where they were swaying in the kitchen and gave them a small smile, lingering near the doorway. Nicky hated to see Joe look so uncertain in their own home. Before he could come up with a way to include him and not risk disrupting the peace they’d brokered, Amira called out, “Baba we’re dancing like at your wedding!”
Joe’s smile grew into a full grin, eyes crinkling, back to looking like the man Nicky loved, like he belonged right here with them.
“You are, aren’t you.” He kicked his shoes off and walked to where they stood, Nicky still holding Amira’s hand. “Can I join?”
Amira twisted away from Nicky, letting go of him and stretching her arms out towards Joe. He scooped her up and lifted her above his head with a little growl before holding her on his hip and spinning with her. She shrieked with delight. Nicky smiled at the scene, even as he felt a tiny twist of jealousy. Joe had managed the same lift move he’d tried with Amira, except he’d done it better.
Despite that bit of envy, which Nicky immediately pushed away, he was genuinely pleased the morning’s commotion seemed long forgotten. He didn’t need to be involved; he could sit at the counter and watch, content to see that everything in their family had righted itself. Just as he took a step away, Joe reached a hand out to grab his wrist.
“It won’t really be like the wedding at all if you sit down,” he said, shifting his grip to interlock their fingers, charming as ever.
Nicky let himself be pulled in, sliding an arm around Joe’s waist, Amira snug between them as the three of them slow danced around the kitchen to the last of the song.
As the music rolled over into a more upbeat song, Joe pulled away and set Amira down on the kitchen counter so he could look at her.
“Ya rouhi ana,” he said, resting his hands on either side of her hips and leaning down to look her in the eye. “You know Baba loves you very much, right?”
Amira nodded, eyes wide and guileless.
“I’m very sorry I got mad today. I shouldn’t have shouted, and I wasn’t really mad at you. I was mad at myself for leaving my work where it could get damaged.”
“It’s ok,” Amira chirped in her small voice.
“It’s not,” Joe sighed. “You still shouldn’t play in there,” he cautioned, “but I know you didn’t mean to damage anything. I’m sorry, and I’ll try and do better.”
“Ok.” Amira kicked her heels against the cabinets.
Joe smacked a kiss to her forehead and helped her jump down.
“Daddy,” she said. “We have to show Baba the noodles!”
She took both their hands and, with Nicky’s gentle prompting, explained the process of pasta making to Joe.
“Is it time to cut them yet?” she asked.
“Not yet. It needs to rest a bit longer.” Nicky gave the wrapped ball of dough a light pat. “But why don’t you look in the fridge and see what we can make to go with the noodles.”
Pleased with this new responsibility, Amira dropped their hands and skipped off towards the fridge.
Joe turned to stand behind Nicky, wrapping arms around his waist and tucking his chin over his shoulder.
“You’re so good with her,” he said into Nicky’s ear.
Nicky twisted around and raised his eyebrows. He searched Joe’s face for a sign he was joking, but Joe was giving him a soft, fond smile, utterly sincere and oblivious to Nicky’s surprise.
“No, you,” Nicky finally said, sealing it with a kiss.