Chapter 20: Table 14

"Helena thinks I'm at the barber," Dad said. "I have until the car comes."

He stood in the corridor with his hands open.

Flynn had not moved from the doorway, and he did not move now.

"Dad," I said. "It's five in the morning."

"I know, sweetheart. I've been up since three." He wet his lips. "I know you have your grandmother's book."

"Chloe told Mom."

"And Mom told me, in the voice she uses when I've lost something."

"She wrote your name, Dad."

"I know she did."

He said it quietly, and he didn't flinch.

I had never heard him say anything about that night without flinching.

"I'm not going to ask you for the book," he said. "Or the page, or the check."

He shook his head. "I'm not going to ask you to stay home or say sorry."

He drew a breath.

"I came because I can't say it to three hundred people if I haven't said it to one."

"Say it, then."

"I can't." His voice shook. "Not yet. But I wanted you to know I'm going to try tonight."

"You're going to try."

"Yes."

"You said 'I can't' on the phone, too."

"I know."

Flynn spoke.

"She sits where she wants, sir," he said. "She doesn't have to sit where you can see her."

Dad looked at him, and something tired and almost grateful crossed his face.

"Then she sits where she wants," he said.

He turned and walked down the corridor toward the elevator, a gray man in a good suit, and he did not look back.

He had called me sweetheart.

It was what he called Chloe, and I wondered if he knew he had said it.

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