Poppy became my daughter, legally, permanently.
Afterward, Wesley met the two of us outside the courthouse steps. He looked at her carefully. Then over at me. "I think about her sometimes, still."
I already knew exactly what he genuinely meant by that. "You made the decision you honestly believed you could actually live with."
He nodded slowly, taking that in. "She's genuinely happy."
"Yeah. She really is."
Poppy reached toward him instinctively. Wesley smiled and let her grab hold of his finger. "She really, truly is."
That same weekend, I brought her out to Willow's grave. Poppy was properly walking by then, though "walking" mostly meant taking six determined steps forward and then simply sitting down wherever gravity happened to decide next.
We brought fresh flowers along. I spread a blanket out beside the headstone and pulled out one of Poppy's favorite picture books. She climbed straight into my lap. I began reading aloud to her. She kept trying to turn three separate pages all at once. "One page at a time," I told her gently.
She giggled at that. I looked over at Willow's carved name. There were still moments, even now, when her death genuinely felt impossible to fully understand or accept. Poppy didn't fix that particular ache. She was never actually supposed to. She was entirely her own person. Her own separate life. Her own genuine joy.
I touched the birthmark on her cheek gently. "I'm going to tell you absolutely everything about your mom someday," I whispered.
Poppy grabbed for the book instead. Apparently she had considerably more urgent concerns at that particular moment. I laughed at that.
