I never noticed eye color before Sean. Never. Friends would ask about a guy’s eye color and i honestly wouldn’t be able to answer.

Now I can. Blue. True blue. They are the eyes of my daughters and the eyes of my best friend, a pale blue, cool and inviting. Steady, loving, my favorite kind of blue.

He sent me an email tonight recounting the night’s events.

I told them a bedtime story about how Mama and Fin had been captured and were made to work in a cavern.

“Were they pirates?” Briar wondered.

“Pirates?” Ave repeated, eyebrows up. This is getting good, said the eyebrows.

I went with it. “Yes, Mama and Fin were in the cavern with Pirates, and their job was to charm the pirates out of their money.”

“Their Gold?” asked Briar.

“Treasure?” said Ave, eyebrows no longer visible.

“You betcha. And if Mama and Fin can work it with the pirates to get them to give up that treasure, they can come home.”

Such a seemingly little thing, but imagining him sitting there, the nightlight casting stars on the ceiling, the girls listening with freshly scrubbed faces glued to him, and telling this fanciful story of our trip made me melt. I forget how wonderful he is with them, how imaginative and magical he can be.

And Fin, well she’s got that same magic and more of that incredible blue. She is working her magic, earning those ducats so that we can get back home, back to our pack of blue.