INSECURITY by Emeera

‘The middle one is Kira,’ Keith pointed at one of the stick figures with enthusiasm.
‘And that’s me, near the dog house. And that’s daddy, because daddy is taaaaall,’ Keith gasped as he stood on his ‘tippy-toes’ and raised his hands above his head to denote the importance of this information.
‘Very good Keith!,’ Mrs Wilson smiled and drew a star on his hand, moving the marker gently.
‘Wow! Look Kira!’ he waved his hand at his sister but was only disappointed when she pouted and turned away. But he soon cheered up at the thought of showing his marvellous work of art to Daddy. Daddy would like it. He always did.
After school that very same day, Daddy smiled, like he always did, as he opened the front door and let Keith and Kira in. They hopped on the couch and pretended to drop dead. Keith noticed Daddy shiver as he watched them, although it wasn’t that cold.
‘Daddy!’ Kira whined and gestured for him to sit near her; when he complied she turned toward Keith and smirked. Daddy carefully untied his shoe-laces, taking his shoes off and putting them aside, next to where the children had kicked theirs off. Smiling, he reached over to Keith and gently hoisted him onto his lap. Daddy always smiled. Kira didn’t seem too happy but did not protest in any form or action.
‘Anything interesting happen today?’ Daddy inquired, wriggling his eyebrows; a gesture he knew that they loved.
‘Boring,’ Kira sighed
Keith waited before proudly showing Daddy the star squeaking, ‘I made a draw-ing today!’
‘Huh! That’s not interesting,’ Kira huffed and rolled her eyes; it was one of her favourite smug gestures.
‘Mm ... let me have a lookie there. Maybe we have a Picasso under our roof’
Keith dashed towards his bag-pack and started fishing for his masterpiece while Kira asked who Picasso was. Puffing, Keith presented his creation to his father. Slowly, Daddy moved his hands and traced the stick figures repeatedly while biting his lip.
Finally, he looked up, smiling and breathed, ‘It’s be-u-ti-ful’. He placed the drawing on the shelf alongside Mummy’s flowers, adding a mental reminder that he would have to have a chat with his son that night.
The rest of the evening was spent playing hide and seek. Before securing his children into their bed-chambers, Daddy asked Keith to follow him. They stopped outside the ‘special’ shelf; the one that had Mummy’s flowers. Daddy gently held the drawing and kneeled down to face Keith. He searched for appropriate words but on finding none simply blurted out, ‘Where’s Mummy?’Keith blinked twice. Sometimes adults could be so difficult to understand.
‘I mean,’ Daddy croaked, ‘where is she in the drawing.’ He paused before slowly continuing, ‘did you forget her?’ He had always dreaded this. Keith rubbed his eyes and simply said, ‘No, I didn’t; she’s there’. Then he yawned and lazily lumped to wards his room.
Daddy looked and spotted a smiling face, with blonde hair, between two clouds that was contentedly looking down at the three stick figures.