Break In My Heart

6. The Theory of Love

"I like it, but you need a bit more character development. Why is Markus feeling this way? Why did he decide to sacrifice himself? I just need a little bit more as a reader, I have too many questions," Padre critiqued as he handed me back my printed out version of my short film script that was due by Monday.

My eyebrows furrowed as I held the twenty or so pages in my hands. "I wanted to leave some things up for the audience to decide?" I said, though it came out as more of a question than a definitive reason.

Padre peeked at me over the top of his glasses as he made himself comfortable in his office chair. "Yeah, right."

I sighed in defeat. This was hard.

Every year the creative writing class, film classes, and audio engineering classes got together to collaborate on short films. It made me excited because I would be working with Kyra and Tyler-- the latter making me more nervous than the former-- but also nerve-wracking because I actually wanted our project to be good.

"Hey kid, lose the frown," Padre said as he threw a pencil at me, causing me to let out a cry in pain as he grinned.

"What the-"

"Your idea is good, and I think it'll translate wonderfully to screen, but do you want to be wonderful or brilliant?"

"Wonderful," I said, causing him to throw something else at me. "Ow! Seriously dad, what's the deal-"

"That was a trick question. Wonderful and brilliant are synonyms of each other." I rolled my eyes. One of the few bad things about having a writer as a dad was wordplay. That, and the fact that he was always trying to write stories about our lives.

I sighed though a grin was tugging at the edge of my lips. "How about exceptional?" I asked, flipping the "l" to make it sound snotty and fancy.

"That's more like it," he said with a wink before his focus fell to his computer. His stories had been picking up a lot of traction and he was getting a lot of amazing deals, and though I didn't consider myself nosy, I may or may not have heard him and Papa talking about a possible movie deal. Exciting.

I picked up the things he'd haphazardly thrown at me and laid them on his desk, knowing he'd forget about them until he stepped on them and hurt himself. "Thanks, Addy," he said, his fingers feverishly typing and his focus still on the screen.

"Yeah, yeah. You're lucky dad is at a meeting or else I'd sick him on you for hurting me."

He raised a brow and looked at me. "Oh would you?"

"Yeah, in fact I would. I'd hit him with the puppy eyes and you'd have a hurricane of pencils and pens falling on you."

He chuckled. "Yeah, your father was always a sucker for some good puppy eyes."

His words stirred something in me. They'd been together for so long, and even after all this time, they still acted like lovesick teenagers who'd just started dating. They never really fought, and when they did it was usually something minor, and they always knew exactly what to say to calm each other down. "Hey, Padre, can I ask you a question?"

"Sì. Velocemente (Yes. Quickly)."

"Um, how did you know that you liked dad? Like, you like-liked him and wanted to be with him?"

"I think the word you're looking for is love, Addison."

"Yeah, you loved him. I mean, he was the first guy you'd been with and you didn't really have many relationships before him-"

"Correction, I had many before Madison. I had four girls on each arm at all times in kindergarten."

I rolled my eyes. "Padre, I'm serious," I whined as he cracked up.