When Lily stepped back, she rubbed her eyes with both fists.
“Thank you,” she said.
Parker had received applause in crowded ballrooms and gratitude from clients whose businesses he had helped save. Nothing had prepared him for a child thanking him for holding her.
“You’re welcome.”
Anna drew Lily onto her lap. Sophie watched quietly, then moved a little closer to Parker.
“Where’s her dad?” she whispered.
He squeezed her hand. “That’s something Lily can tell us if she wants.”
Anna heard him.
“He died last winter,” she said. “His name was Daniel.”
Lily nodded against her mother’s shoulder.
“He worked on boats. He could fix anything.”
Parker waited.
“He had a little stool in the garage,” Lily continued. “I sat there when he worked. He called me his helper.”
Anna kissed the top of her head. “You were.”
The four of them sat beneath the streetlamp while the square grew darker. Parker could see how carefully Anna was holding herself together. He had noticed her worn clothes and tired expression and immediately thought of money. He had missed everything he could not see.
“I’m sorry about Daniel,” he said.
Anna nodded.
“He got sick quickly. We thought we had more time.”
Parker did not ask what illness or how much treatment had cost. Anna would tell him what she wanted him to know.
Sophie leaned forward. “My mom lives in Savannah. I miss her when I’m here, but I can call her.”
Lily considered that.
“I talk to my dad,” she said. “He can’t answer.”
Sophie’s eyes filled. “You can talk to me too.”
Lily looked surprised, then smiled.
Anna checked the time on her phone.
“Our bus should be here soon.”
Parker wanted to offer his car, his driver, anything that might make the evening easier. Instead, he asked, “Would you prefer a ride, or are you comfortable taking the bus?”
“The bus is fine. We know the route.”
“All right.”
Anna looked at him again, as though accepting her answer had surprised her.
Sophie tugged his sleeve.
“Can we get another cone? For sharing this time?”
He turned to Anna. “Would that be okay?”
She glanced at Lily, who was trying hard to appear indifferent.
“Yes,” Anna said. “Thank you.”
They bought two small cups and extra spoons. Sophie insisted cups were wiser because cones had “structural problems.” Lily laughed so suddenly that Anna pressed her lips together.
For a few minutes, they were simply two children eating ice cream while their parents sat nearby.
Before the bus arrived, Sophie asked whether Lily could come to the square another Thursday.
Anna hesitated. “We’re not usually here.”
“Could we exchange numbers?” Parker asked. “If you’d like to arrange something.”
She agreed and entered her number into his phone. He handed it back so she could check it before saving.
When their bus came, Lily waved from the window.
Sophie waved until it disappeared.
Walking home, Parker’s phone vibrated again. He silenced it.
“Daddy?”
“Yes?”
“Lily didn’t want the ice cream first.”
“No.”
“She wanted someone to hold her.”
“I think so.”
Sophie slipped her hand into his.
“Sometimes when you’re home, you’re still working.”
He looked down.
She was studying the pavement, speaking as casually as she had discussed her piano lesson. That made it harder to hear.
“I know,” he said.
“Could you be home more?”
“Yes. I’m going to work on that.”
The next morning, Parker changed his calendar before opening the merger documents. Thursday evenings became unavailable. He moved two recurring late meetings and asked his assistant to flag commitments that conflicted with Sophie’s school events.
It would not solve everything. He knew how easily one urgent call became a missed dinner. He would have to keep making the choice.
That afternoon, he sent Anna a brief message.
Sophie enjoyed meeting Lily. We’ll be in the square after piano next Thursday if you’d like to join us.
Anna answered several hours later.
Lily would like that.
Their next meeting lasted forty minutes. The girls drew chalk flowers beside a bench while Parker and Anna talked.
She had trained as a bookkeeper before Lily was born. During Daniel’s illness, she left work to care for him. Now she worked early shifts at a bakery and was trying to return to bookkeeping, but most interviews conflicted with school pickup.
“I don’t need someone to rescue us,” she said.
“I understand.”
“I’m not sure people always do.”
Parker thought before answering.
“I know several small businesses looking for part-time accounting help. Would an introduction be useful?”
Anna looked toward the girls.
“An introduction would.”
He sent her two contacts the following day. She prepared her résumé, attended the interviews, and accepted a position with an architecture firm that offered flexible hours.
When she told him, he said, “Congratulations.”
She smiled. “They liked my experience.”
“I’m glad.”
He never called the firm to check on her. Her work belonged to her.
Over the following months, the girls became friends. They argued about crayons, invented a game involving invisible horses, and developed an elaborate plan to open a shop that sold cookies and dog collars.
Parker and Anna became friends too.
She was funny when she was rested, blunt when she disagreed, and still grieving in ways that sometimes caught her without warning. Once, at the harbor, a man whistled a tune Daniel used to hum. Anna went quiet. Parker sat beside her while the girls watched the boats.
He learned that companionship sometimes meant letting a silence remain.
Lily spoke about her father more often. Anna enrolled them in a family grief program, and Lily began bringing drawings home from it: memories, feelings, things she wished she could tell him.
One afternoon, she showed Parker a picture of Daniel standing beside a boat.
“That’s his blue shirt,” she explained. “Mama kept it.”
Parker admired the drawing and asked about the boat. He never suggested that Lily should stop missing her father. He never called himself a replacement.
At Sophie’s spring recital, Anna and Lily sat beside him. Parker’s phone was switched off.
Sophie reached the difficult middle section, stumbled, and kept going. When she finished, he stood with everyone else and applauded.
Afterward, she ran into his arms.
“Did you hear the middle?”
“Every note.”
Anna smiled at them. Lily stood beside her, clutching the recital program.
On the sidewalk outside, she approached Parker.
“Can I have a hug too?”
“Of course.”
This time, she stepped into his arms without hesitation. When she pulled away, she began telling Sophie about the invisible horses waiting at home.
Parker watched the girls walk ahead of them.
“I think about that first evening,” Anna said.
“So do I.”
“She’d been asking me whether anyone would ever hug her the way her dad did. I didn’t know what to tell her.”
Parker looked toward Lily, who was now demonstrating how an invisible horse jumped a puddle.
“You were there for her.”
“I was,” Anna said softly. “But I was hurting too.”
He nodded.
They continued down the street together, stopping when the girls wanted to inspect a flower growing through a crack in the pavement.
Later that night, Parker tucked Sophie into bed. She asked about next Thursday.
“Piano first,” he said. “Then the square.”
“With Lily?”
“If she and Anna are free.”
Sophie settled beneath her blanket.
“Good.”
Parker kissed her forehead and remained beside her until she fell asleep.
His laptop waited downstairs. For once, he left it closed.
