Kate

Four years later

Alessio came in the door holding a bear, far larger than our daughter. "Daddy, Daddy, Daddy!" She exclaimed losing interest in her current task of unfolding the laundry I was on the floor trying to fold and organize.

She ran to Alessio, Donato always eager for excitement ran after her and when she clung to Alessio's leg pranced around the two.

"Seduto." Alessio said to Donato who sat immediately. "Piccola." He said sweetly and put his hand on Charlie's head. She bounced up and down on his leg eager to be picked up. He picked her up and kissed all over her little face making her squeal with delight and laughter.

"Charlie, why don't you go take your new, uh, bear, up to your room?"

"Uh-oh." Alessio said and brought her closer to him to whisper in her ear for a few moments, she giggled and he put her down. She could barely drag the bear away it was so huge. "Just get your bunny hon." He said after a while and she ditched the bear in favor of running up the stairs on her hands and feet to retrieve her favorite, and well worn, stuffed bunny.

I started piling the folded laundry back into the basket so that I could take it upstairs. "What are you doing here Alessio?"

"I don't need permission to see my daughter."

"No, but a heads up would be nice." Maybe I wouldn't have spaghetti-o stains across my chest and would have actually given my hair a quick wash had I known he would be here. "The agreement we made was for tomorrow, not tonight."

"I didn't say I was taking her tonight, I just wanted to see my daughter."

"But you'd like to, take her tonight? You wouldn't have told her to get her bunny if you didn't. I don't have her things packed, I haven't bathed her or brushed her teeth, her laundry isn't even clean and you know she likes to wear her cape to your house!"

"It's hardly three in the afternoon. I am perfectly capable of feeding her, brushing her teeth, and bathing her. I don't need anything except the bunny and the cape. We're well supplied."

"What if we had dinner plans or something?"

"Did you?"

"That's not the point, what if we did?"

"Then I would invite you to adjust your plans, and instead to join us for dinner."

He would always extend this offer. To join him for dinner, every single week. For four years. I gave him a look but said nothing as footsteps came down the stairs as Nigel joined us.

"Ah Alessio, how nice to see you, we weren't expecting you."

I crossed my arms over my chest to try to hide the stains. "No worries, I'm only here to see Charlie."

Nigel stuffed his hands in his pockets. "Oh? Are you keeping her tonight?" He asked in a chipper tone.

Nigel was always chipper and pleasant. He was understanding about Alessio's overbearing role in our life, he was a saint when it came to melt downs with Charlie, he was kind, and thoughtful, and always gentle and most importantly, he'd never been a danger to anyone and never been in any trouble in his life.

Understandably, Alessio couldn't stand him.

"If Katherine will allow it." He turned to me.

She already knew he intended to take her tonight, thus his instructions to get her bunny. While bunbun used to be a constant staple in life, she had slowly rescinded to a mere night time requirement for Charlie. She loved spending time with Alessio, he spoiled her rotten, but was also attentive and loving. He didn't have to try to convince her to watch TV so he could get a shower, he never had to scold her for opening the oven while he was trying to cook, he never had to say not now or Daddy is busy, or as soon as Daddy finishes this, he came to Charlie only when he could give her all of his time.

Unlike us.

Us normal people who had jobs and then work outside of work, who had to do our own household chores, cooking, cleaning, washing laundry, cleaning the yard after Donato had been out. I sometimes felt like I just couldn't give her enough time between everything else.

It wasn't as though I could say no when she loved her father so much and he could give her so much more than us. We got along well enough, Alessio had given little fuss to my choosing the name, Charlotte. He had not boomed about the weight her last name would carry and how important it was she be a Genovese, even though my own preference was for children to have their father's last name regardless of the parent's relationship it felt far, far safer for her to be a Santoro. He didn't threaten to mutilate or kill Nigel when he stepped into our lives, and even though he had a lot of snide comments about our shit hole town, he didn't even complain when we moved from New York City to the suburbs.

It was not worth rocking the boat over one night, especially when it would thrill Charlie.

"Yeah, sure, it's fine." If Nigel had known that Alessio was extending all of his invitations to not just Charlie but also myself...he probably would have thought it was a great idea too.

He had been pushing for us to share holidays, insisting how good it would be for Charlie to have all of her parents together on the most important days of her life. He trusted me, and he trusted Alessio even despite what he knew of him because he felt his duty as a father came first and that he would never do anything to hurt the relationship Charlie had grown up with.

I walked Charlie to the car and buckled her into her car seat while Alessio leaned against the car watching me.

"No candy after dinner, and don't forget to brush your teeth after your snack, not before." I instructed Charlie as I buckled her in. "I love you." I rubbed my nose against hers. "More than bears love honey."

"I love you more than flies love poo!" She exclaimed with a giggle at my shocked face. Such an innocent game turned foul so quickly.

"That sure is a lot!" I exclaimed and she giggled again. I turned back around to Alessio. "Please call next time." I shut the car door. "I like to spend time with her too and you know I can't say no when you show up it'd break her heart."

"So spend time with her. Come with us." He shrugged.

"Alessio."

"What? Don't pretend as though it's not tempting. Have you never once thought to allow me to spoil you again, even just for one night?" He pulled a piece of dried spaghetti-o I had missed off my shirt and flicked it with his fingers elsewhere and I crossed my arms over my chest with a flush.

"No, I have not." I said firmly, keeping our boundaries set firm. "Whatever happened to Penelope?" I dodged before he could shake the boat.

He waved the idea off without a word.

He had been with a number of women over the past few years, Penelope was by far the longest he had kept around at nearly eight months. "Whatever. Here." I handed him a bag.

"She has everything she needs at my house already."

"It's a nebulizer. She's supposed to do a breathing treatment every six hours, so just make sure she does it before bed."

"Why does my daughter have a nebulizer?" He demanded and pulled it roughly from my hands. "And why have I been uninformed?"

"One of the kids from our play group had strep throat I guess, when her mom told us I was worried because Charlie had a cough so we took her in. She didn't have strep throat but they did give us a nebulizer for her cough and said to use it every six hours."

"And you didn't think to call me?"

"It's not a big deal Alessio. She doesn't even have a cough anymore. She has a follow up on Tuesday and I guarantee you they'll tell us she doesn't need the nebulizer anymore."

"If my daughter is sick I need to know."

"If I called you in for every doctors appointment, bump on the head, ear ache or sore throat you'd might as well move in, if it was serious I would have called. It wasn't serious, I couldn't even get off work to take her, all they did was test her for strep, it's a throat swab, and listen to her chest."

"So who took her then? Nigel?"

"Yes Alessio. Nigel took her to the doctor."

He scoffed, opened the car door and threw the nebulizer on the floor then slammed it.

"Don't make a big deal out of it, please. She listens to you, better than anyone else, and she's good with the nebulizer. It's shaped like a dog, she named it Doggers. If you're angry about it she won't want to do it again."

"If you couldn't get her to the doctor I should have. Not Nigel."

"They only have walk in hours until 8, I can't skip the morning news you know that, you never would have made it out of the city by then. Lisha told us about her daughter's strep that morning and we just took her in just to be safe. Besides, we've talked about this before. Nigel is allowed to do these things too. She doesn't remember life without him, he's on all of her emergency contact forms, he's practically like a second father to her."

"But he's not." He reminded me sharply. "She is mine, and no one else's."

"We are all aware of the situation. But they love each other too."

To my knowledge, Alessio had never expressed his distaste of Nigel in front of Charlie. But there was distaste. Charlie wasn't even a year old when I had met Nigel. She had no memories of life before Nigel, he was there at breakfast every day, at bed time every night, in the middle of the night when the "monsters" came out, and during the day when we danced or went to the park or put puzzles together. We were very serious, and he was a very good man. The only dirt Alessio had managed to dig up on him was a parking ticket, seven years old. He was a teacher, and down to earth, he was safe and attentive he was-

"He's boring."

Something I had desperately needed when he walked into our life. "I'll not ruin her stability Alessio."

He leaned again the car again. "Very well then." He opened the car door one last time. "Tell your mother goodbye Charlie."

We said our farewells and I came back into the house. Nigel was in her room putting away laundry. She would undoubtedly come home and insist on picking her own clothes following the weekend, would rummage through the door making a mess of it again on Monday. "I hate when he does that."

"Does what?"

"He gets all....Oh I can't even think of a word sometimes. He's just so very Alessio. He shows up unannounced knowing he will always get his way when he does, what if we would have had plans?"

"But we didn't honey."

"And he gets angry and demanding and pushy. He's mad I didn't tell him when we took her to the doctors."

"Maybe you should text him next time."

I groaned and sat down on her bed and watched Nigel.

Nigel was so good to us. Between the two of us both working decent jobs, we had bought ourselves a nice little place in the suburbs. We had decent enough cars, they weren't the newest, but they weren't on their last limb or half my age either. We were getting by well enough, we were comfortable.

I didn't want Alessio's money and he had finally stopped trying to give it to me and had started putting it into a fund for her when she turned 18 instead. He did however still buy her clothes the price of expensive jewelry, enough shoes to wear a different pair every day of the month, and more toys than any kid knew what to do with. He had furnished this room, made it something out of a sort of fairy tale one weekend when I was visiting Nash. Even without ever passing money back and forth he still found a way to provide more than necessary, particularly when not asked.

I had everything I could ask for. Charlie was born healthy and full term despite several complications during the pregnancy, she was bright and bubbly, she was full of sass but so much love as well. She loved to snuggle and just watch a movie with us just as much as she loved going to the park and running wild. Alessio and I were good co-parents, we funded her life, got along, no matter our own issues we always put Charlie first, shared holidays fairly. I had a fiancé who adored us, both of us, Charlie and myself. He was fair and kind, he never raised his voice, in his worst anger he would go for a jog to calm down before coming back to talk. Our lives were stable, and safe.

And yes.

Boring.