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It is unusual on the weekend, that Alex and Henry aren’t woken up by a knock on their door. They had thought to begin with, that maybe they should be waking their girls up, rather than the other way round.
They would sometimes rise before their daughters, but more so, their freshly four-year-olds really liked to knock on their daddies’ door, and often, they would happily curl up in bed with them for a bit, before they would all head down for breakfast.
On this particular Saturday, Alex wakes first, looking at the clock, and finding it hard to believe it’s almost 9am. He runs his hand through Henry’s ruffled hair and kisses him on the cheek, whereupon his sleeping gorgeous lump of husband lets out a string of incoherent noises, before he sits up and stretches.
Henry’s eyes go wide when he checks the time himself, and he looks at Alex, astonished.
‘I know’ Alex says, shimmying out of the bed and pulling a shirt on ‘I dread to think.’
Henry pulls on his own shirt and follows Alex out of their bedroom. Down the hall, Victoria’s door is ajar and Alex sticks his head in, to find her sitting up in bed, making her plushies talk to each other. Henry pokes his head in too, and Victoria turns her head and beams at them.
‘Oh my god, hi Daddies!’
Henry chuckles behind him as Alex goes to sit on Victoria’s bed and kisses the top of her head.
‘Good morning, V, are you ok?’
‘Uhuh’ she nods, before she looks up at him ‘oh my days, Papa, you and Daddy had lots and lots of sleep.’
‘Where did you learn that expression, darling?’ Henry asks as he sits on the other side of the bed ‘oh my days? And oh my god?’
‘Froms Auntie Pez’ Victoria smiles ‘he’s so funny.’
‘He is’ Henry smiles at her ‘is it ok that we had lots and lots of sleep?’
‘Uhuh’ Victoria nods, before she exclaims excitedly ‘it’s Tangled Day, Daddies!’
‘It is’ they say at the same time.
‘And I thinks if you don’t sleep lots, you might falls asleep for Tangled Day, like you did when we was watching The Little Mermaid, Daddy.’
Alex looks at Henry to find him biting his lip with amusement.
‘I promise not to fall asleep for Tangled Day, darling.’
‘That’s good, Daddy’ she smiles as she squishes two toys together and says ‘kiss kiss.’
‘Should we go see if Eleanor is awake, sweetie? And go and have some breakfast?’
Victoria nods delightedly and holds her arms up. Although she is definitely old enough to walk downstairs herself, neither Alex and Henry minded the request in the slightest, they’ll take every cuddle they can get.
Henry scoops Victoria up and she boops his nose and says
‘Oh my Tangled Days, Daddy’ and Henry laughs and kisses her temple.
Eleanor, they soon find out is also awake, and is lying on her front on her bed, flipping through a big Winnie-the-Pooh book. She beams at them all and says ‘good morning’ cheerfully. When she sees Victoria is in Henry’s arms, she lifts her own up, and Alex bends to pick her up.
She wraps her arms around Alex’s neck and he kisses her head and says softly
‘Good morning, my love.’
More so than anything, Alex is surprised, given the girls hadn’t been the ones to wake them up, that the dogs had not managed it somehow. Upon entering the kitchen, Alex sees however, that they didn’t get to sleep in scot-free.
Victoria squirms to get out of Henry’s arms but he holds her steady and says
‘Be careful, little love. Baymax has had an accident, so you don’t want to step in it. I’m going to put you down on the island, ok?’
Victoria nods, swivelling her head to look at David and Baymax. Alex puts Eleanor down beside her sister, and opens the back door.
Stepping carefully around Baymax, who is sitting in the middle of a puddle of his own pee, right beside all the doggy pads they’d left down for this eventuality, Alex picks David up, and sets him on the back porch, with a scratch to his ears.
‘It’s ok, Baymax’ Alex says ‘you’re only a puppy, it happens, especially with your dads sleeping in longer than they meant to. We’re going to give you a quick bath, and it’ll all be fine.’
Henry fills up the sink, as Alex wipes up the mess on the floor, and throws the paper towels in the trash. He washes his hands, and lifts the girls, who had been discussing their dreams, off the island one by one.
Alex grabs four bowls, spoons, cereal, and milk, and puts everything down on the kitchen table, where the girls have climbed into their chairs. He pours the milk slowly for them, as they oooh over the milk turning chocolate.
Alex looks over at Henry before he pours his own breakfast. He feels a twinge as Henry catches his eye, where he is giving Baymax a sink bath, and Alex is thrown back to when their babies were little, and they were able to do that with them.
He looks to Victoria, still managing to smile as she eats her Cocoa Pops, her Tangled pyjamas rumpled, and to Eleanor who is eating more slowly, in her butterfly patterned pyjamas. Alex can hardly believe they’re four, even if their birthday had been only a couple of weeks before.
Henry deposits Baymax on the porch to shake himself dry, stepping back hastily to avoid getting splashed. The girls help Alex put away their dishes, and fill the dogs’ food and water bowls, as Henry eats his breakfast, and then they head back upstairs to get dressed, and brush their teeth.
Alex and Henry get dressed first, before they help the girls. No deliberation of outfits is needed today, both of the girls want to wear the dresses they got when they went to the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique at Disney. Once Victoria has been zipped into her Tangled dress, she spins with happiness, until they have to remind her, to be careful, as she’s just eaten.
Henry braids Victoria’s hair like Rapunzel’s, though without the flowers and she bounces with excitement, as she retrieves Mr. Roar and her Pascal plushie from her room. Henry goes to play with her in her room, while they wait for Alex to do Eleanor’s hair in a braid crown, her yellow Belle dress crinkling between Alex’s legs.
Alex is glad they could deter them both from the living room, as Victoria’s gasp when they enter is more than worth the effort he and Henry went through.
‘Oh my god, Daddies!’ she gasps as she puts her hands on her cheeks, her mouth open as she tips her head back and spins slowly ‘it’s so pretty!’
‘So pretty’ Eleanor echoes awestruck.
The night before, once the girls were asleep, with the help of a couple of ladders, and some handheld extendable clotheslines, Alex and Henry had strung purple banners with suns, just like in Tangled, all across the ceiling of the living room.
Alex must admit, it looks very impressive in the daylight, and even more so, once he opens a window, and the banners flutter with the slight breeze.
‘Take a picture, Daddies!’ Victoria says suddenly, as if struck by inspiration ‘take a picture please!’
Alex and Henry take plenty, Victoria’s close-eyed, ecstatic toothy grin making Alex’s heart exceedingly full.
Once they’ve done that, Alex sets up the TV, as Henry sorts the snacks. Victoria squishes into the sofa, placing Pascal on her lap facing forward ‘so he can see’ with Mr. Roar beside her. Eleanor places her sun shaped Jellycat beside Mr. Roar and sits beside the toys, and her sister.
David and Baymax trail after Henry when he comes in from the kitchen, probably most interested in the food he is carrying, not that they’ll be allowed either chocolate or popcorn.
He sets down the tray, handing the girls their novelty cups with the fun straws, and a coffee to Alex, smiling at him, as he sits down with his own tea. Baymax jumps at the bottom of the sofa, and Alex scoops him up and puts him on Eleanor’s lap, where she promptly lays her face in his soft fur. Henry lifts David, to lie beside him, with Victoria on his other side, and Alex sits beside Eleanor.
‘We ready?’ Alex asks once they have all settled.
‘Yes!’ the girls exclaim together, and Alex presses play.
Alex can feel the excitement radiating off Victoria, even with Eleanor between them and he turns his head to watch her, instead of the movie. She looks so happy, both of the girls do, but Victoria especially, and in it’s usual manner, his heart feels like it’s about to leap out of his chest with love.
The movie starts the same as the animated version, and within seconds, both the girls gasp, with Victoria being the one to declare
‘He looks like you, Papa!’
Alex turns his head back to the TV, and sees in this live action version, the actor does actually look remarkably like him, albeit begrudgingly, a bit taller, and without the glasses.
‘He does look like Papa’ Henry agrees ‘he’s so handsome, isn’t he?’
‘Uhuh’ Victoria nods vigorously.
Eleanor looks from the screen to Alex, who smiles at her.
‘Handsome?’ she asks.
‘Beautiful, pretty…’ Henry supplies.
‘Like flowers?’ Eleanor asks.
‘Yeah, sweetie’ Alex says, rubbing his thumb against the top of her ear ‘like flowers.’
The girls’ sounds effects and commentary continues, Alex’s heart doing another somersault when Pascal first appears on screen and Victoria says quietly, leaning down to her plushie ‘look Pascal, it’s you!’
As many times as they’ve watched the original Tangled, and as much as Alex could recite it in his sleep, it is a joy to watch both the movie, and the girls’ reactions to it. They chatter and they laugh, and sing along, of course. For the song in the pub ‘I’ve Got A Dream’, Henry sits at the piano at the girls’ requests, and they clap for him at the end of the song, where Henry puts his hand on his stomach and bows, and the girls giggle.
Henry bends to kiss Alex before he sits back down, saying quietly to him ‘for good luck.’
Out of all the scenes, the one that Alex has been looking forward to the most, is the lanterns. He expects Victoria to vibrate out of her skin with excitement, and although he isn’t far off, she instead bursts into tears. Henry quickly pulls her onto his lap and holds her close as he kisses her head.
‘I feel fizzy inside, Daddy’ she says between sniffs ‘and like there’s a frog in my belly, doing the bouncing.’
‘That’s ok, darling’ Henry says gently ‘it’s so beautiful, isn’t it?’
‘Yeah’ Victoria says with another sniff ‘it’s so so soooo beautiful, oh my god.’
‘Oh my god’ Alex mouths to Henry who laughs noiselessly in return.
Eleanor beside Alex, stares wide-eyed and open-mouthed at the TV, absentmindedly petting Baymax as she lets out a long, low ‘wowwwwww’.
It is, Alex must admit, even without the innocent eyes of their daughters, very beautiful. Eleanor starts to sing quietly under her breath, as they all watch the lanterns gleam and glimmer and shine, Victoria’s sniffles tailing off as the song does.
Both the girls, bless their hearts, get upset when Flynn, well ‘Eugene, Daddies!’ gets hurt, even though they know he’ll be ok.
Eleanor climbs into Alex’s lap, and Alex quickly moves Baymax out of hers.
‘It’s likes you’re hurt, Papa, I don’t like it’ Eleanor says quietly, anguished.
‘Oh, my sweet girl’ he says quietly back ‘that’s ok, I’m ok, it’ll be over in a minute.’
Eleanor nods, but squishes back into Alex’s chest nonetheless, and Alex puts Baymax gently back in her lap, for some extra comfort.
As the movie draws to a close, the girls getting a bit restless, Alex is surprised to find he bursts into tears himself, when Rapunzel is reunited with her parents, and when he looks to Henry, he sees tears sliding down his face too.
It was a lot, when his family was his everything, to see one back together on screen, after being apart for so long. Alex can not even imagine it, the thought of not seeing their precious daughters for that long, his chest pangs at even the notion. He knows too, how much Henry wishes he could embrace his own dad like that, like the king on screen embraces the princess.
Once the movie is over, the girls clap adorably, and everyone goes to the bathroom, before they help tidy up the snacks.
‘Should we all go for a walk?’ Alex asks once everything has been put away.
Everyone expresses their agreement, and they get leashes on David and Baymax, and put on sunscreen, before they head out with their usual clamouring chaos.
They walk towards the playground, and along the way, run into a bunch of neighbours that they know, who stop and exclaim over the girls’ dresses. Victoria happily spins for every single one of them.
Once they reach the playground, a bunch of kids, and even some parents are also in rhapsodies about their dresses. It is definitely something, to see a miniature Rapunzel, flying down a slide, with her sneakers flashing.
They go to their favourite café for lunch, where yet more people compliment the girls, and he and Henry agree that yes, they are wonderful, and beautiful, and every superlative in between. The girls, to their credit, say ‘thank you!’ to all the people who speak so sweetly to them, and swing their legs joyfully, as they eat their food, and chatter in detail about the movie.
Once they’re back home, and everyone’s shoes have been put away, Alex wonders out loud, what they should do with the rest of the day. The girls turn to him, Victoria and Eleanor sharing a knowing look between them before Victoria says
‘Can we watch Tangled agains, please, Papa?’
But, of course. Alex falls asleep later that night, after two more viewings of Tangled, with ‘I See the Light’ still playing non-stop in his head.