He picks up her dress from the sink ledge and flicks his fingers upward, motioning for her to raise her arms. She obeys and feels the fabric and his hands compress down her length as he slips the dress over her body.

“Daddy?”

“Yes?”

“I think I need a new dress.”

He furrows his eyebrows and takes a step back to look at her entirety. The dress fits snug, the hem of the skirt barely reaching halfway down her thighs. Her chest seems stuffed into the fabric. Overall, her body looks rigid and uncomfortable.

She is growing too fast, he thinks.

“Yes . . . yes, yes, you are right, my sweet. I’ll see what I can do.”

He steps back toward her, placing his hands on her arms. He presses his fingers into her skin, feeling how she has aged, and sighs. He leans into her and kisses her forehead, inhaling her scent.

He is still taller than her, but she has grown enough to the point where she can rest her forehead on the center of his chest while they both stand. She does that now, and he grabs the brush off the sink to run it through her hair. She closes her eyes and feels the bristles glide down her back. His chest feels like a still wall against her unstable body.

He places the brush back and pulls her off his chest. She stands upright and looks at him as he parts her hair down the middle with his fingertips. Around his wrist are two black hairbands. He twists half of her hair in his palm, tugging at her scalp, and ties it into place with one band. He removes the second band to tie the other half of her hair, and when he does, she can see the tattoo. The black lace crawling across his skin. It looks painful. A swollen dot and a vein throbbing and bulging from beneath like a purple snake hunting for escape.

“Daddy?”

“Yes, my sweet?” he answers just as he finishes tying the second pigtail.

“What happened to your wrist?”

She reaches out to touch it; he lets her despite his flinch. She traces her finger across the swollen vein, careful not to press down. Afraid she might hurt him by busting it wide open and letting the snake rip his skin apart in order to breathe.

He smiles to himself, watching her fascination as he reaches into his pocket and pulls out a thin strip of black fabric. “Well, you see, Vanilla, I was so excited to see you that my happy freckle nearly exploded.”

She makes eye contact with him, the sparkle in his stare consuming her. She scrunches up her nose and giggles, but his face grows solid and hungry and she eats her giggles down.

“Da—”

But before she can start, the black fabric is tied across her eyes. She is led out of the bathroom, her steps staggered. She hears the bathroom door shut behind them, and that’s when she begins to count.