Edmund sat across the booth at the mall’s pizza place from Cassie. They both had one of those enormous, greasy slices on paper plates and a 20 ounce bottle of Coke. It had been a good afternoon out for them. They’d watched Kung Fu Panda 3 at a matinee and then played skee ball at the arcade for most of an hour.
It was the most time they’d spent together since Jennifer had moved out two weeks ago.
Edmund was chewing a mouthful of crust and cheese when Cassie asked, “Dad…are you a racist?”
You break a man’s heart often enough and he almost stops feeling it the next time.
Edmund wiped a little pizza grease off his chin. “What do you think, munchkin?”
Cassie looked at him for several seconds before answering, “I don’t know.… Aunt Jessie says you are. Mom did a couple of times too.”
Edmund had promised himself he wouldn’t badmouth Cassie’s mom in front of her. It wasn’t for Jennifer’s sake. But it just seemed so toxic to him for Cassie to hear from one parent how awful the other was. Or worse yet, from both.
So what did that leave him to say here? How did he defend himself, but not further wound his daughter?
“Honestly, Cassie, I’m not even sure what that word means anymore.”
Cassie looked at him skeptically. “Miss Rachel at school says racists are the worst thing ever. She told us about how mean they were to black people and Native Americans and everyone.”
Edmund winced at how familiar this sounded, how just a year ago, he’d have said most of the same things.
He felt tension building up in his neck and shoulders and realized that a conversation with his 11 year old daughter now felt like one of the more stressful job interviews he’d been through.
“And what do you think, Cassie?”
She took a bite of pizza and chewed for a while before answering. “I don’t think you’re one of the worst people ever. I don’t know about racist.”
Edmund had to restrain himself from deflating in an enormous sigh of relief. Instead, he said, “Well, whatever anyone else says, I’m still the guy who loves you, and Gunnar, and…still Mommy, even. And that’s not changing, okay?”
Cassie gave him a shy smile, and he felt he’d won a minor victory, even though things were obviously not going to be the same between them.
“You want to get some ice cream before I take you back to Mom?”
Cassie looked at him and thought hard about this. “Not ice cream. Milkshakes.”
“Sounds good to me. Sonic?”
She nodded and smiled again, broader this time.
The Mayor of Christ Mountain 
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