Tender Care

Thirty-eight

"Nova"

Ben called, checking the time on his phone.

Nova quickly looked up at him, as she was just thinking and staring down at her shoes.

"Y-yeah?"

"Your time is up, you can come out of time out now"

Ben said, motioning her over to where he sat at a small table.

It's actually only been 12 minutes instead of 15, but that was good enough for him.

"It is?" Nova asked, picking at the skin on her fingers.

She felt shy now, she didn't like others seeing her get in trouble. And that's what Ben saw.

"Let's not do that to your fingers, love. Just c'mere" Ben insisted, giving a small smile.

Nova nodded, standing up from the chair and walking over to Ben.

"Come sit" Ben repeated, pulling out the chair next to him at the table, he then patted the seat.

Nova went over, taking a seat next to him.

"You want to do a puzzle? I think there's one that's packed" Ben assumed, pointing to her bags that had plenty of toys.

He realized she was acting more quiet so maybe an activity would distract her a bit.

"Sure" Nova nodded, up for doing that.

She stared at Ben while he got up from his seat and went through one of her bags to find it.

Ben laid out all the 30 pieces of the puzzle before Nova and him starting finding some to put together.

Nova liked smaller puzzles because the bigger ones made her head hurt from it being too hard.

While they did that, the two also watched the tv in front of them that had the show live on it.

The band was on the song 'strong' now.

"So Nova, you doing okay today?" Ben asked, feeling a little awkward asking.

It was basically just silence between them as they did the puzzle, so now speaking up felt weird.

"Mhm" Nova nodded, not really being truthful about her answer.

Ben was about to respond but Nova interrupted him.

"Found one" Nova mumbled with a small smile. She just found her second pair of pieces that fit together.

"That's good, hun" Ben chuckled, before silence took over them again.

"B-bad day a little bit" Nova confessed, fidgeting with a  puzzle piece in her hand.

Ben didn't even have to go on more, because she did herself.

"Oh really?" Ben questioned, glancing over at Nova.