Safe Haven

Paint by Charlie

Charlie loves to paint with colorful pencils. Everywhere her blocks and pens were spread out. Crayons, watercolor, eddings - she just had everything. Jay knew exactly what he would give her as soon as she reached the right age - paint by numbers. For her 3 years she was able to draw good stick figures, flowers, suns or animals. It was a mixture of scribble and modern art as Jay explained her images to Intelligence, because even there her pictures hung in the break room. She made a portrait picture for everyone or, as Adam says, anonymous pictures of Intelligence members. No one can be identified. Also not on the skin color or hair color, because Charlie took the color, what she had the most desire. So there was a red Adam, a green Kevin or a yellow Hank. Kim and Hailey were both painted pink. Antonio and Jay shared the blue color in the pictures.

Now Charlie sat on the carpet in the living room of the new and bigger apartment where they moved a few weeks ago. She painted a flower, a tree and a house smaller than the stick figures. She finished her artwork, pulled herself up and ran joyfully to her daddy in the kitchen.

"Daddy, come with me", her little hand grasped Jay's and she pulled the detective behind her. In the living room, she showed pride her new artwork. Breathless and wide-eyed, Jay looked at her picture. For a moment he closed his eyes and took a deep breath. How could he leave a toddler alone with Eddings?

"Charlie, what did you do? You can't paint walls!"

The first tears rolled down her little cheeks. More and more she began to sob. She did not mean to upset her daddy. She just wanted to surprise him.

"Us!" she cried, pointing to the stick figures. One of them was tall, brown hair, holding a little girl by the oversized big hand.

With her cute voice and drawing, the detective could not be mad at her. He squatted down to her height and look proud at her artwork.

For a moment, he was not happy at all that she was painting the living room wall, but the picture of them made the detective smile.

Gently, he put his hand on her smaller shoulder, hugged the toddler and gave her a kiss on the forehead, "It's perfect. You're my little artist."

"Not mad?" she looked at him in surprise, but the man just shook his head and grinned proudly over both ears, "Never... but it's better if you paint on paper, alright?"

Jay saw Charlie breathing out. He thought for a moment, because the wall piece was already painted, it did not matter anyway.

"Charlie, would you like to get your finger paint?" he asked and immediately the 3-year-old ran away. She returned with the bright colors and looked curiously at her daddy. He opened a tube and released the yellow paint on a paper plate. Then he reached for her hand and dipped it in the paint. He then brought her hand to the wall.

"My hand is on the wall," Charlie marveled, watching her dad as he dipped his hand into the blue color and immortalized it next to hers.

"Do you know Charlie, what to do with very valuable artwork?" Jay asked, but Charlie shook her head, "Well, you frame it in a picture frame. How about we frame your artwork, too?"

Enthusiastically, the toddler nodded and immediately began to show her artistic vein flow. Even Jay was not idle. With his most beautiful handwriting he wrote Charlie & Daddy in bright colors under the handprints.

After their painting lesson, they looked proudly at their small artwork, which now graced the living room to the left side of the TV.

"Does it look good?" Jay asked and Charlie chuckled in agreement. She took a splash of paint on her finger and nudged the detective's nose.

"You're a cheeky young lady," Jay grinned, painting her face as well. Jay jerked his smartphone out of his pocket and snapped a picture. Curiously, Charlie grabbed the rectangular thing. In doing so, she switched to the selfie mode and considered herself fascinating.

"Let's get a picture of us?" Jay asked as he showed her how it worked. They both had colorful dots and lines on their faces.

CPDCPDCPD

"Now sit down please," Jay sighed, "Why are you hyperactive in the evening?"

He was really annoyed. Charlie could not keep still for a minute.

Jay actually wanted a comfortable evening, watching the Blackhawks game and drinking beer. Only once without disturbance. The last days were exhausting and the case very time consuming. He stretched his legs long and put them on the coffee table. Charlie looked at her dad. It was hard for her to stop laughing. And then she laughed, jumping up from the floor and dancing in front of the TV.

"Get up Daddy! Dance with me!" Charlie giggled. Jay sighed. Was there a right of return? Can he exchange the child? Of course, he was glad that the quiet girl was so active and does not afraid of his friends anymore, but sometimes he longed for a little rest.

"Charlie, honey, please play in your room," Jay said, but Charlie just grinned cheekily. Her eyes went to the eddings. She picked up a felt-tip pen and turned to paint the television as Jay jumped up from the couch, stumbled over her toy and took the pencil out of her hand.

"We talked about it this afternoon, Charlie. You only paint on paper." Jay said sternly because his apartment was sacred to him. At least his laptop and the flat screen TV. Maybe he built a security system around the TV like the artworks are protected in a museum.The youth welfare office did not warn him that children paint or take everything in the mouth. Jay was pretty sure he was more loving a toddler. Even if his big brother totally disagreed.

"Are you mad?" Charlie asked scared. Jay shook his head, "No, I'm not mad at you. Only there are some rules and one rule says you can only paint on paper."

"Where are the rules?" Charlie asked curiously.

"Nowhere. You can't read yet," Jay replied, but Charlie protested that then there would be no rules.

Jay fetched paper and pencils and began to write down their rules, while Charlie painted flowers and animals beside it.

It was partly his rules that he explained to Charlie before he adopted her. It was typical rules of keeping order, helping in the household, not kissing boys or doing homework first.

"I don't like it," Charlie said as she looked at the letters.

"Oh yes? Do you know what it says?" Jay asked, raising an eyebrow. Charlie nodded.

"Then you don't want a pancakes Sunday or a pizza Friday?" Jay asked with a grin.

"No! Best rules ever!" Charlie shrieked.

Jay held his hand protectively in front of his ear. Why do kids have the habit of screaming straight into the ear? No wonder seniors hear so badly.