When Mr. Nakamura had first given Claire to the Bennets, Sandra had fallen in love right away. She exclaimed over Claire's blonde curls, so much like her own, and her chubby cheeks, so adorable. She bought all the baby things she had never had a chance to buy before, and most of all, she cuddled Claire all day long. Every time Mr. Bennet came home, he found Claire in her new mother's lap, smiling and chuckling. Claire learned new words and cute baby tricks. Sandra loved having a little one to play with. (Mr. Bennet often wondered if this hungry maternal instinct was what drove his wife to spend so much time on Mr. Muggles. It made him wonder if he shouldn't have agreed to have more kids, like she'd wanted to even after Lyle. This secret guilt was the reason that he had never complained about her dog obsession.)
Claire called Sandra "Mama" almost from the first day she lived with them, but despite Sandra's best efforts, Claire refused to say "Dada" on command. Mr. Bennet wasn't home much, and when he was, he was tired out from a day that was much more difficult and complicated than he could ever explain to his little family. He would sit by his wife and daughter as they laughed and played, but the most he could usually manage to contribute was a wan smile and a few half-hearted comments.
This began to change the first time that he had to babysit alone. Sandra asked him to watch Claire on a Saturday so that she could finally get her hair done and a have a little time to run errands by herself in peace, and he couldn't refuse such a desperate-sounding request. He found himself on his own for several hours, somehow completely lost in his own house. It didn't even look like his house anymore, what with all the baby trappings. He decided to make the best of it and began playing with Claire, trying to remember what almost-two-year-olds liked to do.
He built block towers. He rocked baby dolls. He made stuffed animals talk and dance. He had tickle wars. He changed diapers. He finagled oatmeal and crackers into Claire's evasive mouth. Altogether, he had a day that was easily as tough as any of his usual days at work.
At the end of the afternoon, just a few minutes before Sandra was supposed to get home, he laid Claire down on the couch for her nap. (He knew that she usually took naps in her own room, but he had to do work on the computer in the living room, and he felt like he would worry about her if he left her where he couldn't see her.)
He had just gotten absorbed in the file open on his screen when he felt a tap on his knee. He looked down and saw that Claire had sneaked off the couch and was now sitting under his desk, practically on top of his shoe.
"What is it, Claire?" he asked, unable to keep from smiling at her intent stare.
She replied with a question. It was only one word, but it was clearly a question. "Dada?"
"Yes?" Then he realized what she had said, and what she meant. She was asking if he was her dad—the man her mother said he was, who would take care of her, and love her. Although he had been hiding from it, he knew the answer.
"Yes, Claire-bear, Dada's here." He pulled her out from under the desk and set her in his lap, and she laid her little head against his shoulder. He leaned down and kissed her blonde curls (the first kiss he had given her, come to think of it). He knew that there was no going back now.
When Sandra came home, she found her husband absorbed in work as usual, but this time, his daughter was nestled in his lap, sound asleep. When he looked up from the computer and put his finger over his lips to shush her, she smiled, seeing that Claire had finally found her place in the family—under her father's protection, loved and safe.