The request was so simple and so impossible that I almost laughed. “Lily?—”
“I know you said she’s not coming back. But I miss her, Daddy. And… I think you miss her too.”
My hands tightened on the steering wheel. “What makes you think that?”
“You look sad all the time.” She paused, her voice shrinking. “I don’t like it when you’re sad.”
“I’m not sad, sweetheart.” The lie tasted bitter even as I said it.
“Yes you are.” She said it with the certainty of a child who knew her father better than he knew himself. “So if I win the competition, will you try to bring her back? Please?”
I looked at my daughter in the mirror. At the hope in her eyes that I’d already disappointed too many times.
“I’ll try,” I said—and felt the truth of it settle in my chest.
And realized I meant it.
I started planning the trip to London weeks before Lily’s competition, because I needed time to figure out what I was going to say.
Sorry didn’t feel like enough.
“I was wrong”felt inadequate.
“I pushed you away because I was scared of losing someone else again”sounded too much like an excuse—even if it was the truth.
Dr. Morton asked me during our session what I wanted from going to London.
“To apologize,” I said.
“For?”
“For exploding at her. For not letting her explain. For punishing her for something that wasn’t her fault.”
“And then what?”
“What do you mean?”
“After you apologize, then what? Do you want her back in New York? Back in your home? Back in Lily’s life?”
I was quiet for a long moment. “I want her to know that I don’t hate her. That I understand why she was scared to tell me. That I—” I stopped.
“That you what?”
“That I forgive her. And that maybe… someday… she could forgive me too.”
Dr. Morton smiled. “That’s a good start.”
Lily won her competition.
Not just won—dominated. She danced with this fierce concentration and passion that made my chest hurt. When they announced her name as the winner, she didn’t scream or jump or celebrate the way the other kids did.
She just looked at me through the observation window and smiled—small, certain, triumphant.
The kind of smile that said you promised—and I knew I had.
We flew to London the following week.
I’d found Sarah’s address through Gianna, who’d gotten it from somewhere she refused to specify. The flight was long and Lily slept most of it, her competition trophy clutched in her arms like a talisman.
