“Are you sure you’re okay with being named if necessary?” she asks.
“Yes. It’s the right thing to do.”
There’s music playing when I walk into the house, set my things down, and watch Lucy twirling in a circle, belly laughing.
“A little ballerina on your hands,” Anna laughs.
“How about a figure skater?” I ask.
She stops mid-twirl and runs at me. I love this. I catch her as she launches herself at me. “On the ice like you?”
I kiss her little cheek, “On the ice like me.”
She grabs my face, “Mommy Hildy said you have a surprise for me.”
Hildy walks around the corner, drying her hands on a towel, and smiles.
I cock my head to the side.
“I told her you found a new school for her.”
I smile, “Wefound a new school.”
“Do I get to see it?”
“Yep, tonight before the game, if you, Anna, and Hildy want to meet me there.” I head to the island, kiss Hildy’s cheek on the way, and set Lucy on her booster. “But I did get my three favorite girls something.”
After grabbing the bag from the entrance, I set it on the Island. “I brought something home.”
I pull the first jersey out and hold it out, showing her, “This is for you.” I hold it in front of her, “A little long, but you’re a growing girl.”
“I love it, thank you!”
The second one is folded differently.
Hildy’s name stitched across the back. “You didn’t.”
“I did.”
I walk to her and place it over her shoulders. It falls perfectly. She looks smaller inside it and somehow stronger at the same time.
“You look stunning in red.” I kiss her with restraint that doesn’t seem possible, yet there it is.
Then I pull the last one out, Anna’s.
Two numbers stitched cleanly across the back. Mine and Kilovac’s, replicating the one she wore to Yale when the stands were rarely full, and no one knew what we would become.
Anna’s voice is soft, “You remembered.”
“Of course I did. You stood for both of us.”
Chapter 23
Everything
Hildy
When Lenzin said he was sending a car and the driver was Scotti, I was expecting a Lyft or an Uber, not a large SUV with blacked-out windows rolling up. I also didn’t expect an incredibly tall woman wearing sharp, oversized sunglasses with blonde hair pulled into a low, sleek ponytail, wearing a black wool coat that probably costs more than my monthly rent used to.
