My daughter throws herself on the pavement of the preschool parking lot after she asks if tomorrow is Christmas and I tell her it's not. I kneel down because my therapist tells me I should get on her level for hard talks, but I put my head in a pothole because I saw on Facebook the other day that ostriches don't really bury their heads when they’re scared, and this made me cry because I’d always thought, what a funny thing. Someone ought to do it because everyone thinks ostriches do it and Cherise from the PTO won't, Darren the volunteer music teacher either.
I pull my head out of the ground because air is important and we're in a heat advisory and the more I think about it, of course ostriches don’t bury their heads. I brush rubble off my shoulder, spread my arms and tell my daughter to come here, but she throws a rock into an empty parking spot. I wouldn't have said anything if it hit a car. I wouldn't have said anything if it broke a window because it wouldn't because she's four. People tell me that one day, she'll break boys' hearts. I tell them that she'll break more than hearts. I say to her, go inside or we're not getting a pretzel tonight, and I think that one day, she'll call my bluff because she'll notice that I've gained twenty pounds in Friday night pretzels and post-bedtime beers since she was born. That one day, she'll tell me to fuck off and walk into school by herself.
I sit next to my daughter on the pavement, grab a pebble and throw it across the lot. It hits a curb, bounces back toward us. She giggles, tells me she can throw one farther, picks one up and throws it five feet, maybe six. I pat the ground for another, curl it into my fist and stand, twist at the hips, pull my arm behind my head in a stretch while she chants do it do it do it. I set myself like a pitcher and she chants louder, do it do it do it, so I draw back my arm and fling it forward, pretend to fall and drop the rock at my feet. I stand with my head between my legs as she bounces from one foot to the other, says I win I win I win, and I tell her guess what and she says what and I tell her that I used to think that ostriches buried their heads in the ground when they were scared. She says that's silly and asks me to carry her inside, can I have up please, so I pick her up, take her inside, hug her and say goodbye. She runs into the room and I run downstairs to wave at her in the classroom window, but she doesn't show. Evan who works in my building sidesteps me, tugs on his son who says what's that man doing? Another family does the same and I take the hint.
On the way to the car I kick a pebble, the one I'd dropped. It skips across the pavement, jumps a crack and collides with a Cheerio. I pick it up and press it against my skin until my fingertips look like berries fat with juice, ready to burst like the ones I smashed on my daughter's plate when she was little and would rub them into her palms, gather them in fistfuls that she'd mash against her mouth before outstretching her hands, up dada.
