A Father's Love

Chapter 56

Sadly, Monday came and Harvey returned to Shelby's classroom where he belonged. Well, Luke tried to be happy since at two o'clock, early Sunday morning, the tiny fur ball decided he was extremely dehydrated and went wild on his water bottle, waking the entire apartment. The solution was to remove the water bottle, but Shelby was afraid Harvey would die if he got thirsty again. So Luke just put a small dish of water in there in case Harvey got thirsty again and returned his water bottle the next morning when everyone was awake. But when he saw how sad his little buddy was to have to take the hamster back to school, he decided to tell her; he was thinking on Shelby's request to have some kind of pet. That perked her up a little, and honestly meant it, too.

What perked her up even more was basketball practice and straight from practice, another town meeting. Though, with her mind freshly in pet mode from the weekend guest, Shelby didn't like what Taylor wanted to do to the birds who were leaving droppings on people's cars. Having brought her toy Nerf gun along, she sneakily fired a dart in the man's direction, getting Taylor in the forehead.

Lorelai noticed it, but instead of scolding her, quietly but quickly helped Shelby hide the evidence by stashing it behind them as Taylor called out for the culprit, very annoyed. Luke saw it as well but pretended not to, trying not to smile, much less laugh. At that point, Miss Patty's current boyfriend walked in and took the attention away.

The topic of birds was dropped, to Shelby's delight, who wanted to shoot another one but that time, Luke stopped her, letting her know once was enough for now. He also reminded her she couldn't do something like that in any other setting besides town meetings that involved Taylor. The topic ended up changed to the town's loner wanting to stage a protest.

When Shelby heard Lorelai call the guy, the town loner, she said, innocently, "I taw Dad was tuh town loner?"

"Nope," Lorelai shook her head. "There's another one." She nudged the little girl with her elbow as a surprised look appeared on her face, as if Shelby was in awe.

Luke sat there, staring at his daughter, holding his arms folded, casually. Looking ahead, he gave her a kick in the leg. Not enough to hurt, but it made Shelby retaliate with a kick to his leg, starting a fun game of Swift Kick as they called it, only half paying attention to what was being said. It was enough for him to point out the Revolutionary War when Taylor tried to say protesting was "un-American" as Shelby kicked him again. Not hard but playfully as she knew better. By that point, looking out of the corner of his eye, Luke pinned her back in her seat, holding a clawed hand to her stomach, tickling it. When Taylor finally dismissed the meeting, Luke let go so he could stand up. Shelby immediately tackled his legs, playfully punching them with her right fist. He reminded her to grab her Nerf gun before Taylor finds it and takes it, turning her around with a hand on top of her head.

"Wha' abou' my dar', Dad?" she asked. "Ta one I sho' a' Taylor?"

At that moment, Babette interrupted them, bringing over Shelby's dart. "Here, sugar."

Shelby took the dart, thanking the older woman.

"You're welcome," Babette smiled for her. "Nice shooting there, Tex."

Shelby smiled proudly before she and Luke caught up with Lorelai and Rory, who were waiting for them.

"Hey, what do you know about this town loner guy?" she asked Luke.

"Same as everyone," he shrugged as they made their way down the steps, "just kind of skulks around with that backpack, never smiles." They started heading in the diner's direction.

"Does he also make cheeseburgers and secretly harbors a desire to wear a backwards baseball cap?"

Luke gave the woman the same stare he gave Shelby, only more irritated, to which Lorelai started singing Luke and the guy were identical cousins, thus causing him to ban Shelby from hanging around Lorelai, yet again. That is until a car drove by, catching their attention.