She won’t. We both know she won’t. But I don’t say that.
“Thanks for coming,” I say instead, because I was raised with manners even when I don’t want to use them.
“Of course. She’s my daughter too, Zayden.”
I take a deep breath and let it out slowly.
The door closes behind her, and I stand there for a second, fists clenched at my sides, breathing through the anger that’s threatening to swallow me whole.
Then I turn around, and Maisie is just... sitting there. Not crying. Not angry. Just quiet, staring at her hands like they hold the answers to questions she’s too young to be asking.
“Hey, shadow.” I cross to the couch and sit down next to her. “You hungry? We could make mac and cheese. The good kind, with the breadcrumbs.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“Okay. What about a movie? We could watchEncantoagain.”
“I don’t want to.”
I don’t push. Just sit there with her, shoulder to shoulder, and let the silence stretch.
After a long moment, she says, “She didn’t even look at my dress.”
My heart cracks clean in half.
“I saw it,” I tell her. “You look beautiful, Maze. The most beautiful girl in the whole park.”
“But she didn’t see.”
“I know.” I put my arm around her, and she leans into me—small and warm and so much stronger than any kid should have to be. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.”
It’s not. It’s so far from okay I don’t even know how to begin fixing it. But I don’t say that either. I just hold my daughter and wish, not for the first time, that I could be enough to fill the hole her mother keeps leaving.
• • •
Bedtime is quiet.
We go through the routine—bath, pajamas, teeth brushing, two books instead of three because she’s tired in a way that has nothing to do with sleep.
The bath water turned gray from the playground dirt, swirling down the drain like the day washing away. She didn’t splash like she usually does. Didn’t make her rubber ducks talk to each other in silly voices. Just sat there, quiet, while I washed her hair and tried to pretend everything was normal.
Her pajamas are the ones with the unicorns—her favorites—and I made sure to pick them specifically. Small comfort. Better than nothing.
I tuck her in, make sure Ellie the elephant is in position, and click on the nightlight.
Then I lie down next to her, because some nights she needs that. Tonight is definitely one of those nights.
“Daddy?”
“Yeah, shadow?”
“Is she coming back?”
I stare at the glow-in-the-dark stars we stuck on her ceiling last summer, searching for an answer that isn’t a lie but also won’t break her heart.
“I don’t know,” I finally say. “But I’m always here. Yeah?”
