Chapter 2

"Mommy, why did Daddy call Xander his baby?"

Three days later, Sadie ran out with a brand new audio story player.

That day, Jasper got Vincent to send it over as a gift to make it up to Sadie. The pink device had Sadie's name engraved on it. On the card, Jasper had written: To Daddy's favorite little swan.

It was the same brand that Xander was using.

Jasper had activated the device with his family account, yet he had forgotten to sign it out of his cloud account.

The first time Sadie connected the device to the internet, ninety-nine personal voice messages were downloaded from his cloud storage.

[Xander, be good and sleep now. When you wake up, Daddy will bring you to the beach.]

[Don't be afraid of thunderstorms, Daddy's here.]

The next recording was a birthday song that Jasper sang off-key.

The first voice recording was from three years ago.

That day, Sadie was having a high fever. She called him and begged him to tell her a bedtime story.

He said that he was in a business meeting, and he told me not to spoil Sadie, that she would fall asleep once she got tired of crying.

However, on the same night, he recorded a twelve-minute-long audio of himself reading out the story of The Little Prince.

Jasper remembered that Xander was afraid of thunderstorms, disliked eating carrots, and the words of encouragement he would need before a competition.

Sadie did not cry after listening to all the recordings. Instead, she pointed at the device and asked me.

"Did Daddy write my name wrong?"

At the same time, the door was unlocked.

Jasper walked in. When he saw the device, he shut it off.

"I accidentally connected to the wrong account. I'll get IT to delete it."

I stopped him.

"How can we delete those ninety-nine recordings from our minds and pretend they meant nothing?"

"Xander couldn't sleep well in the past, and Dakota ran out of ways to make him sleep.

"I just recorded a few stories. Don't make it a bigger deal than it actually is."

"You recorded all these in the span of three years, yet you never recorded anything for Sadie before."

Sadie looked up. "Daddy, I'm afraid of thunderstorms too."

Jasper knelt down to examine her knee.

The blood had stained the bandage. He disinfected it again and gently blew on her wound.

Sadie wanted to get closer to him, but he said, "I'm home now. You should be good.

"Don't ever use a few recordings to help your mom make a fuss about divorce again, understand?"

Sadie froze.

Jasper patted her head.

"You have your mommy with you, but Xander has nothing."

How could he use my love for Sadie as an excuse for his absence?

Jasper took out a crystal swan.

"It's a limited edition; I bought it just for you."

Sadie asked, "Does Xander have one?"

"No."

He had answered it too quickly.

The next second, Dakota uploaded a photo to social media.

Xander was hugging a bigger crystal swan.

[Thank you, Jasper, for being such a good father. You remember the tiniest passing remarks from Xander.]

Jasper snatched my phone from me.

"Dakota likes to flaunt. This swan suits Sadie better."

"Why does she need to second-guess if Xander will have something better whenever she receives a gift?"

"Lilian, don't be so petty.

"I gave you a marriage and a home. Xander only has a few material goods.

"Why are you so ungrateful?"

Sadie placed the swan in his palm.

"Daddy, you can take it back.

"I don't want to guess if someone else has a better version of what I have every time I get a gift from you."

Jasper's expression sank. "Who taught you this?"

I shielded Sadie.

"You're the one who did that to her repeatedly."

That night, Sadie did not throw the device away. Instead, she took out the batteries and put them in the bottom of her bag.

I asked why she was keeping it.

She answered, "If I miss Daddy again, I'll restart this device.

"After I listen to it, I'll remember that it's not because he doesn't know how to be a dad.

"It's just that he doesn't care about me."