His expression is hard to read. Not the judgment from this morning. Something else. Softer.
He lifts his hand in a small wave.
I wave back.
Joy doesn’t notice, too busy laughing about Frank’s camera angle and how the photo’s probably already on Bristol Bay’s Facebook. But I feel Dad’s gaze follow us all the way down Main Street.
The house iswarm when we get back, smelling of Mom’s cinnamon rolls. The kind of smell that never made sense after a day on the boats—sweet, soft, safe. Joy heads upstairs to change, and I’m about to follow when Dad’s voice stops me.
“Got a minute?”
I turn. He’s standing in the doorway of his office, the converted mudroom where he runs Bristol Bay Provisions, computer humming, invoices stacked on the desk. Even now, part of me expects him to smell like diesel and salt, not paper and toner.
“Sure.”
He gestures me in, closes the door. A photo on the wall catches my eye—me, age twelve, holding my first king salmon, grinning. Dad’s arm around my shoulders, both of us soaked and happy. Behind us, the boat’s deck is slick with rain and fish scales, ropes coiled like snakes. I can still remember the ache in my palms from hauling the net.
He sits at the desk but doesn’t look at me right away. Just stares at his hands—work-roughened, scarred from nets and hooks and thirty years on the water. There’s a faint white line along one knuckle where a gillnet once caught and nearly pulled him over.
“Saw you at the harbor,” he says finally.
“Yeah.”
“That girl. Joy. She’s good for you.”
I wait. There’s more coming.
“Hannah looked—” He stops, tries again. “She looked like she realized what she gave up.”
“Maybe.” I lean against the wall, careful. “Doesn’t matter now.”
“No.” He looks up. “It doesn’t. Because you moved on. Built something. And I—” His jaw works. “I gave you shit for it.”
The words hang.
“Dad—”
“Let me finish.” He exhales, rough. “I started with one boat. Worked my ass off. Then I realized if I wanted to succeed, I couldn’t just fish. Had to process. Had to ship. Had to build infrastructure.”
I nod slowly, not sure where this is going.
“First time I hired someone else to run a boat while I stayed onshore handling logistics, I felt like a sellout.” He laughs bitterly. “Like I wasn’t a real fisherman anymore. Just some guy in an office, sending emails, running numbers. Even now, when Levi’s out there in the rain and I’m here under a roof, it still itches. I miss the danger. The way a line can snap and break a wrist, or a rogue wave can throw you against the drum. That’s what felt real to me—risking something you could lose.”
The radiator hisses. Outside, someone’s kids shriek with laughter.
“You built a business,” I say quietly. “That’s not selling out.”
“No. It’s not.” His eyes meet mine. “But it took me years to believe that. And in the meantime, I looked at you—taking endorsements, doing media, building something bigger than just hockey—and I saw myself. Saw the guilt I felt. The fear that I’d left the real work behind.”
My throat tightens.
“So I judged you for it,” he says. “For doing exactly what I did. For taking something honest and scaling it up. For leaving the dock and finding a bigger ocean. I kept telling myself hockey was safe because it paid well. I forgot it’s a contact sport—broken bones, concussions, knees blown out—and you still get back on the ice. Hell, that’s no different from a man climbing back on a deck after watching a wave take his skiff.”
I can’t speak.
“I was wrong,” Dad continues, voice rough. “When you left for juniors, I took it personal. I’d built this business for you. Told myself you’d come back, take over, make it bigger.”
I swallow hard. “Dad?—”
