Written for VMFICRECS November challenge-6d. "Sweetheart, what did you bury in the garden?" Rob Thomas owns all, I'm just borrowing some characters.
"Sweetheart, what did you bury in the garden?" Veronica said walking in to the house. "Because whatever it is, the puppy is busy digging it back up."
Her five year old little girl popped up and ran outside. "Nooooooo."
Veronica rolled her eyes at the drama and followed the little blonde back outside. She was curious to see what it was that was so important.
Veronica found the little girl kneeling in the freshly dug earth , scolding the border collie puppy who was now rolling in the dirt she had dug up. They had piles all over the yard from the puppy digging. The puppy did better when they were able to take her out for long runs, but Southern California had been hit by El Nino this year and it had been raining. A lot. Which of course meant that both the little girl and the puppy were now covered in mud. She shrugged her shoulders, that's what baths were for. What she was really curious about was exactly what it was that Nora had buried.
"Honey. What do you have there that you don't want the dog to get." She asked.
"It's my Daddy box. And it can't come out until he's home." The little girl was almost, but not quite, in tears.
"Your Daddy box? What's in that, sweetie?" Veronica suddenly realized where all of the missing toys had been for the last five and a half months. There was a small rubbermaid (thank God, she'd decided to go with something that was waterproof) bin sitting half in and half out of the hole the puppy had dug. Veronica wasn't quite sure how the dog had been able to pull it out, but then she still wasn't sure how the dog had gotten into the closed door of the pantry to dig through the trash. The puppy's antics were a mystery that she might never solve.
"It's my box with all the things that Daddy's loves to play with me. I didn't want him to be sad that I got to play with them while he was gone, so I put them in my Daddy box and buried them until he comes home." Nora was digging the hole bigger but it kept falling in on itself due to the muddiness of the ground. The little girl was getting visibly frustrated. Veronica looked down and was glad she was wearing old jeans. She pulled the box all the way out and was relieved that it seemed to have held up for the time it had been buried in the yard.
She pulled her little girl in and gave her a big hug. "Honey, how about this. Daddy will be home in how many days?"
"Eleven Days." Nora recited from looking at the countdown calendar they had on the fridge and the one in her room and the one in Veronica's office.
"That's right, eleven days. so how about we put this box in the garage under a tarp and you'll still be able to tell Daddy that you saved the toys for him." She couldn't wait to share this story with Logan, it was one of the sweetest things that her daughter had done this deployment. And that was saying a lot. The kid had walked around with a stuffed "Daddy" for the first two months and still slept with it. She insisted on a picture every morning of her outfit and a video every night to tell him about her day. She was amazingly open with her feelings and stubborn enough to insist on how she wanted to deal with Daddy being gone for so long. Logan had started doing the same picture and videos for Nora too. Pretty funny since he pretty much wore the same thing every day. You know, uniform and all.
The kid was an amazing mix of the two of them. Her hair, his eyes, her ears (thank god), his ability to express emotions, her size. Every day she did something that made Veronica thank Logan for convincing her that they could be good parents. Having Nora had changed the way that Veronica looked at the world and looked at Logan. He had been her 100% partner every step of the way. Thinking about what his reaction was going to be about the "Daddy box", she decided she'd let Nora tell him about it. He'd melt into a puddle of goo when he heard, the marshmallow.
This deployment had been the first that Nora really remembered. They'd talked about it constantly once he had been informed. How Daddy would be gone for 6 months. How they would only be able to see him when he called them. It was a lot for a five year old to take, but she'd held up pretty well aside from the requisite daily photos and videos. Veronica knew Logan loved the emails he got daily from them. It helped him to feel like he still knew what was going on in their lives. They had decided that he was going to chose to discharge when his commitment was up the next time, so this was, hopefully, his last long deployment. They hadn't talked about it with Nora yet, just in case things went to hell in the world and he was needed.
Veronica was snapped out of her thoughts when Nora agreed that they could put it in the garage.
"But Momma, we need to make sure we don't get dirt on Daddy's car. He'd be really sad." And then she tried to pick up the box and slipped into the hole. Veronica pulled her out of the hole and then helped carry the box into the garage, safely away from the BMW. Nora was right, Logan wouldn't want any dirt on his car.
"Can you tell me about what you put in the Daddy box, sugarpuss?" She pulled out her phone and started recording as Nora opened the box.
"Say hi to Daddy, honey."