#dopple!perseverance

[sometimes-life-gets-hard]

Basically Lexi calling Callum “daddy” that’s it.

Ben had a long day at the arches. The last bloke - Mr. John - really did his head in. Making all these crazy demands not listening to Ben at all, clearly thinking he knew more about his car than anyone else. “Idiot”, Ben muttered under his breath making his way home.

Callum has really only been home for about an hour and since Kathy was looking after Lex all day he offered to look after her until dinner. It’s not like he’d never done it before. Lex was used to him by now, last week she demanded he read her a bedtime story instead of Ben which - made Callum’s heart swell in his chest and even more so when he saw the surprised but happy half-grin, half-confused look on Ben’s face as he handed Callum the book over saying “Alright then” and a little quieter, just for Callum: “What have you done with my girl, ey?” Callum couldn’t hold the grin back that spread across his face. “Twist her around my little finger - just as I did with you.” He laught. “Oi” Ben was flirting, this wasn’t good. “I want to have words with you once you read my baby princess her good night story.” - Clearly more than words were had that night. But that’s why Callum thought, ‘this can’t be too bad right? We get along, just a quick hour until Ben’s here for dinner.’ It’s been 45 minutes now and Callum feels like he’s worked a dopple shift in the Vic, how can anyone have this much energy? They have already played Twister, Memory and Miss Watson which was Lex’s invention where Callum was Sherlock Holmes and Lex was Miss Watson, who was really the brain of the operation - obviously. At the moment they were just about to crack the case.

Ben entered the house through the kitchen, going straight to the kitchen sink, filling up a big glass with water and gulping it down. He really needed that. He closed his eyes for a second and tried to calm himself down, he didn’t want Callum or Lexi to see him like this. That’s when he heard their voices. “No Mr Holmes that makes no sense at all”, he heard Lexi proclaim. “Mr Teddy can’t have been the bad guy because he was with me the whole day.” She stretched the word ‘whole’ extra long to make clear that there was absolutely no chance of him being anywhere else that day. Ben smiled. He got Lexi a children’s version of the Sherlock Holmes stories for her birthday because he knew how much she loved to read. Since then she was obsessed and now it seems like Callum has fallen victim to her games again. It can be quite cute but Lex also has perseverance! These games can take hours and Lex won’t get tired of finding new clues and making up new stories. Ben really loved how clever and creative she turned out. He is so proud of her already. He was just about to go and rescue Callum when Lexi said something that made him stop dead in his tracks in the doorway to the living room. “No you can’t talk to Mrs Rabbit, you have to interview Mr Rabbit okay daddy Callum?“ Callum visibly freezed aswell. Lexi looks at Callum, clearly waiting for a responds. For a second it feels like the world stops. Then Ben find’s his vocal cords again that got tangled up in the strings of his beating heart. “What’s this then?”, he asks entering the living room? “Daddy!” Lexi screams running into Ben’s arms. “Hello princess”, he greets her, “how was your day?” “It was so good daddy! Mr Granger gave me a star for my math test!” She told him excited. “Well you are a clever star aren’t you?” Ben tickled her. Then he looked over to Callum who still stood where Lexi had left him. “Hi”, Ben said smiling. “Daddy Callum”, he teased him. Finally Callum broke out into a grin. “Hi”.