Daddy's Lie

Randy White came up behind his wife and encircled her waist with both arms. He whispered into her ear, "I just bought us fifteen minutes alone. Let's go make out on the couch."

She smiled and leaned her head back, resting it on his shoulder. "Make out on the couch? Are we still in high school?"

"We can be for the next fifteen minutes," he said releasing her waist and taking her hand. She didn't resist as he led her toward their living room.

"What did you have to do to manage this?" she asked.

"I told the twins I saw a unicorn behind the hedges out back." Her schoolgirl giggle reminded Randy of why he fell in love with her all those years ago. Slowly seating her on the couch cushions, he bent and gave her a soft, delicate kiss. He could feel her body relax and her lips melt into his own.

"Only fifteen minutes?" she asked breathily, moving her mouth to his ear.

Closing his eyes to the sensation of her warm breath, he murmured, "Maybe twenty."

#

Aiden and Addison White made their way purposefully across the yard toward the giant shrub that served as a boundary between their backyard and the vacant field beyond.

"C'mon Addy. Hurry before the unicorn leaves," Aiden practically bounced around his sister, his anticipation overflowing.

"We can't, Aiden. Daddy said that we have to go slow and be quiet so that we don't scare it away." At eight years old, Addison White had already begun to display a budding sense of maturity that her brother did not. Where Aiden was impulsive, she exhibited restraint. Aiden forgot parental instructions as quickly as they were conveyed, whereas Addison possessed the ability to remember and execute even the most detailed of directions.

Aiden reluctantly fell in next to his sister, shuffling his feet and absent-mindedly kicking fallen pinecones.

"Aiden! Stop it! We're supposed to be quiet." He launched into an exaggerated tiptoeing walk, raising his knee almost to his chest and, after a particularly long stride, gently settling just the toe of his shoe on the ground. To Addison he looked like Elmer Fudd hunting wabbits from the morning cartoons. She couldn't help but to laugh.

Aiden stopped, struck with a sudden thought. "Daddy wouldn't lie about the unicorn… would he?"

Addison kept walking and answered him matter-of-factly, "Daddies don't lie, Aiden. C'mon, we're almost there."

Approaching the edge of the yard, Aiden made a sudden dash to their right, calling out as he ran, "I'm going to look over here."

"Aiden! Shhhh!" If he heard the irritation in the urgent plea of his twin, he gave no visible indication. She watched the awkward, arm-flapping sprint of her brother abruptly stop as he darted left toward the hedges. Before she could get out another word, he dropped to the ground and effortlessly scurried out of sight into the thick greenery.

I'm never going to see a unicorn now, Addison thought dejectedly. Nevertheless, her attention turned toward the hedge looming in front of her. Gently getting onto her hands and knees, she cautiously crawled forward into a small opening between the bushes.

By the time light from the field appeared through a hole on the other side of the hedge, Addison felt tears beginning to fall onto her cheek and thought of turning back. Her skin stung and throbbed as a result of the multitudes of scratches to the parts of her body left unprotected by the t-shirt and shorts she wore. The thought of seeing a real, live unicorn, however, propelled her the last few inches. Daddies don't lie.

Lying on her stomach, hands on the ground in front of her and engulfed within the thick hedge, Addison tentatively pulled the coarse, spiny leaves of the bush to the side to create a small opening near the bottom. Nudging her face closer, she gazed out on the field beyond, fully expecting to see Aiden galloping in and out of the four or five pine trees scattered in front of her. Nothing but wind-strewn brown needles and pinecones intermingled with tufts of grass, struggling to revive after winter's dormancy, speckled the terrain. Disappointment commenced to knot her stomach and replenish the welling in her now dry eyes.

A movement to the left involuntarily shifted her unfocused gaze. A couple of quick blinks cleared her burgeoning tears and allowed her eyes to focus on a remote corner of the field. Addison emitted a sharp gasp, pulling bits of fallen hedge and dirt into her slack-jawed mouth. She didn't notice. The unicorn stood majestically under a lone apple tree. A soft glow radiated from its brilliant white coat, white mane, white tail, and perfectly tapered white horn. Unsullied by the brown dirt surrounding it, Addison thought that she had never seen anything more beautiful--not even pictures of Mommy in her wedding dress.

The unicorn shook its head abruptly from side to side, then up and down. Addison dared not breathe for fear that it would run away. Slowly she watched the remarkable animal begin to move, turning its muscled body with short, graceful steps until it directly faced Addison's hiding spot under the hedge. She resisted the urge to blink the dryness from her eyes. Bottomless deep black eyes locked with hers, she could feel the unicorn's gaze meeting her own. Addison lost all sense of time and place as the unicorn bent one of its front legs, straightened the other, and bowed, the pointed tip of its horn hovering less than an inch from the ground. Rising, it nodded its head once more. Spellbound, Addison watched the unicorn turn and, with three powerful strides, disappear from her view.

She heard a muffled sound coming from behind her. Returning from her trance-like state, the noise became clearer until she clearly discerned Aiden's voice calling her name.

"I'm coming," she yelled back. No longer aware of the scratches covering her arms and legs, Addison retreated from the bushes and emerged into their backyard where she rolled onto her back and let out a blissful sigh.

Aiden ran to where she lay. "There weren't no unicorns back there," he said plopping onto the ground next to her. "I think Daddy lied."

Addison watched a lazy white cloud make its way across an otherwise clear, spring sky and imagined that it looked like a unicorn. She turned her head toward her brother and in a distracted voice told him, "Daddies don't lie, Aiden."

END