My Family Saved Their Adopted Daughter First, Then I Died Before Their Eyes novel · Chapter 23 of 24

Chapter 23: March Ninth

Eli burned the cake.

He stood at the open oven of the little lake cottage on the ninth of March.

A black, smoking layer sat in his mitts, and he looked stricken.

"It's fine," I said.

"It's charcoal."

"It's fine."

"Nellie says it's fine," Birdie called from the table, where she was cutting grilled cheese into triangles with a butter knife. "Daddy, we can put the frosting on thick."

Eli went still at the stove.

She had said it in passing, between two other sentences.

He set the pan down and wiped his hand on his jeans.

He didn't turn around for a moment.

"Thick frosting," he said, rough. "I can do that."

The cottage smelled of toast and burned sugar. Ray Hadley's old toolbox sat on the counter, because Birdie had decided it was where the candles lived.

It was her seventh birthday, and it was the first March ninth that had belonged to her.

Brody came at four with a wrapped box and a paper bag. He had been sober for five months and looked ten pounds heavier and younger.

"Happy birthday, kid."

"Uncle Brody!"

He knelt and let her hit him at full speed.

Behind him on the step, Dale stood with his hat in his hands.

I hadn't invited him. Eli had. He had called my father the week before, said nothing about forgiveness, and told him the time.

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