ROGUE

63 : Dreaming

Your POV

My five year old daughter plodded through the playground miserably and met me at the school gates, where I was accompanied by a dozen other parents who were waiting to pick up their kids after a long day of learning.

I instantly furrowed my eyebrows the moment I saw her, and I could tell that she wasn't acting like her usual happy self.
A frown was stained onto her delicate face, and she stared intensely at the ground as she took slow, zombie-like steps.

Whenever I laid eyes on her beautiful features, I was immediately reminded of her father, which made me love her even more.
She shared the same light brown hair as Jason, and it fell in perfect ringlets right down to her spine. Her autumn eyes were the beautiful colour of honey, and forever contained a mischievous twinkle.
She had Jason's lips as well, pink and plump.
The only resemblance I shared with my stunning daughter was the shape of her face, and her cute little nose. She had high cheekbones, and two dimples. I knew that when she grew older, there would be a serious boy problem.

When she finally made her way over to me, she didn't connect eye-contact, and she desperately tried to hide whatever was bothering her.
Let's just say she was a lot like her dad.

"Hey, baby," I smiled at her reassuringly, taking hold of one of her tiny hands. I jumped straight into it, hating the fact that there was something that was deeply troubling my daughter. "Is everything alright?"

When I dropped her off at school this morning, her smile was as bright as the sun, so I knew that some sort of negative event had occurred throughout the day.

She furrowed her eyebrows in what seemed like anger. My daughter was not an angry person, believe it or not, so this kind of behaviour surprised me. "I just want to go home." She mumbled, still avoiding eye contact.

I kneeled down to her level and gently rested my hands on her shoulders. "Did you have a bad day, sweetie?" I pushed a stray strand of her curly hair behind her ear, whilst desperately searching her tormented face.
She nodded simply, and I noticed tears collecting in her beautiful eyes, she held them back though, obviously not wanting to let anyone see her cry.
I sighed. "What happened?" I said softly, feeling my heart ache.

She waited a moment, before she finally connected eye-contact. She blinked back her tears and tried to stop her bottom lip from trembling. She didn't speak for a moment, and it was like she was expecting me to understand. "Is daddy a bad man?" She whispered, before a tear escaped her left eye.
She wiped it away furiously, and stared at me through the blur of her tears, waiting for an answer.

My breath hitched.
I hadn't told my daughter about the things Jason had done, and I intended to keep it that way.
To her, Jason wasn't the criminal that the whole world saw him as.
But instead, she saw him as her whole world.
He was more than just a father to her, he was her best friend. Her everything.

I shook my head immediately, my heart pounding quickly in my chest. "Of course not, honey," I let out a nervous laugh. "Why would you think that?" 

All of a sudden, she broke down.

She covered her face with her hands, so that no one could see her crying. But every time I heard a hiccuping sob, it tore me apart.
"Miss Woods was teaching us about J-Jason McCann. And she said that h-he... He kills people all the time." She whimpered, before looking up at me and giving me the most agonising look. "Does daddy kill people?"