So things just continue to get weirder around here.



Last weekend, for example, I plunged unexpectedly into the temperate waters of domesticity, a place I have not been for oh, let’s say, ONE YEAR EXACTLY when I was forced out of the condo I shared with Loseur and into my own sexy bachelorette pad complete with hardwood floors, red lamps, and the Red Couch O’ Love.



Not only did I spend three days straight with Indie Rock Dad (IRD) (not very defensive of me, I admit), one of those days was spent with his three-and-a-half year old daughter.



You’re thinking “Uh-oh. Kids. Is this the Breakup Babe we know? She’s supposed to be writing about cute boys, smoky bars, romantic angst! But kids?!”



Well. You might find this surprising, but BB hearts kids. And kids heart BB. This adorable child was no exception. And in fact, in the way she opened her heart to me so quickly, she reminded me of her father, who seems to have done a complete about face since a month ago.



Once he did, in fact, decide that he wanted to date me (after two weeks of pretending he didn’t), IRD’s true colors emerged. The fact is, he is a romantic. Easily smitten, intensely affectionate, and emotionally vulnerable – he has put his heart right out there on that big dining room table of his for me to stomp on or embrace as I choose.



Just like his utterly charming little daughter, who, an hour after meeting me, wanted nothing more than to hold my hand, play with me, cuddle with me, and later – for me to lie in bed with her and sing her to sleep.



“Will you sing a song to me?” she whispered in the darkness, her little arm thrown around my neck, her hand on my cheek, as she faced me sideways on the bed just like her father does.



It was an odd sort of intimacy. Completely genuine, yet not founded on anything but a day’s worth of knowing me.



Like the outlines of love. Just waiting to be filled in.



The question is, after a year of being on the run, of jumping from boy to boy, can I do this? I’m not as trusting as I used to be, like that little girl who asks a stranger to sing to her in darkness. Once I was, maybe. I believed that if someone said they loved me, they would take care of me always, just like my parents (who sang to me in the dark) have done.



Now, however, post-Loser, I just expect someone to slash my throat.