His Minimalism Threw Away My Daughter's Heart

My husband lived by minimalism.

Three years of marriage, and our home was as bare as a model unit.

On our two-year-old daughter's birthday, the toys her grandparents brought through the front door went out the back the moment they left.

He kept saying the house didn't need that kind of clutter, that I had too much craving for things, that I didn't know restraint.

Then, a few days later, I got a photo of him at his "other home."

In it, he was sitting on a soft rug, holding the teddy bear he'd thrown out, coaxing a strange little boy to call him Daddy.

So it turned out he didn't hate the cozy little decorations and toys.

They just couldn't exist in our home.

……

Friday morning.

I was in the kitchen making breakfast for the family.

Peter James liked his eggs runny, I ate mine fully cooked, and for Coco Abbott, our two-year-old, I made the soft scrambled eggs that were easy on her stomach.

Once the eggs were done, I used the heat still in the pan to warm the toast.

We didn't have a bread machine.

Or rather, we used to.

Peter just decided it took up too much space, so all of it got "decluttered."

He said a skillet could heat it just as well.

It could, sure. But you had to watch the heat the whole time, and the edges would scorch the second you looked away.

Not like a bread machine, where you press it down and go do something else.

He thought throwing out the machine was decluttering. What he didn't know was that the machine he threw out cost me that much more of my own energy to make up for.

When everything was ready, I carried the breakfast out.

Peter was holding his phone, reading the news, gold-rimmed glasses, his suit crisp, every inch the picture of an elite professional.

Coco sat beside him with a cloth book open in front of her, pointing at the duck page and quacking, flipping back and forth.

"Daddy, quack quack."

Peter swiped at his screen and gave a vague hum.

Coco poked the duck again and pushed the book closer to him. "Daddy! Quack quack!"

Peter frowned and looked up at me. "She's almost three. It's time to get rid of babyish stuff like this."

I set the breakfast down without a word. "That's her favorite. She's been flipping through it for a year and still isn't bored of it."

"A year?" His frown deepened. "Then it definitely needs to go. It's all covered in drool."

"Peter, that's the one she loves most."

He ignored me, reached straight over, and pulled the cloth book out of Coco's tight little grip.

Coco froze, staring at her empty hands, looking again and again, not understanding how the thing had vanished from them.

"Daddy……" She tugged at the hem of his shirt. "Quack quack……"

"I'll buy you a new one later." Peter tossed the cloth book into the trash without a second look. "Eat first."

Coco lowered her head and looked at the book lying in the trash, her lips pressing into a pout, but she didn't dare cry.

Because Peter had scolded her for it before.

I set the plate in my hands down and picked the book back out of the trash.

Peter put down his chopsticks and shot me a look. "Sheila Pruitt, if you keep doing this, she'll grow up to—"

"She's only two right now." I set the book down in front of Coco. "How about Mommy washes it clean and then gives it back to you, okay?"

Coco nodded and looked at the book with a careful, treasuring glance.

Peter glanced at Coco and swallowed whatever he'd been about to say. He poked at his egg, and the yolk slid down over the white onto the plate.

"What time are your parents coming tomorrow?"

"They said sometime after ten in the morning."

"Mm." He took a sip of milk. "Don't order a cake that's too sweet. Too much of it isn't good for kids."

"I know."

He set down his bowl, and just as he was getting ready to leave, he suddenly spoke up. "That book—once you wash it, don't give it straight back to her. Let it dry in the sun. Plush toys and cloth books are the easiest things for germs to hide in."

"……Got it."

The next day, Coco's grandparents arrived with armloads of toys and gifts.