I laughed a little. “She would.”
“She always said I was a terrible liar. Remember? She said I couldn’t keep a secret about a birthday present for five minutes.” He laughed too, but it was a sad laugh. “And then I went and kept the biggest secret of my life from you. For three years.”
“Why, Dad? Really, why?”
He was quiet.
“Because when your mother got sick,” he said slowly, “I didn’t tell you how bad it was. Not until the very end. You were sixteen. I thought I was protecting you.” He took a breath. “And you never forgave me for that. Not really. You told me once you wished you’d known sooner, so you could have said goodbye properly.”
I closed my eyes. I remembered saying that. I was nineteen. We were standing at her grave.
“I swore I’d never do that to you again,” Dad said. “And then I did exactly the same thing. Because I’m a coward too, kiddo. I can’t stand watching my girls hurt. I’ll do anything to stop it. Even when the anything is worse.”
I sat on Sarah’s couch with Pickles in my lap and cried.
“Dad,” I said. “I’m not sixteen anymore.”
“I know, honey.”
“I’m thirty-five. You have to let me get hurt sometimes. You have to let me handle things.”
“I know,” Dad said. “I know. I’m going to try. I promise I’m going to try.”
Ethan and I met for the first time on a Tuesday evening, at the end of the third week.
I picked the place. Not our Italian restaurant. Not Paolo. I picked a little coffee shop near Sarah’s apartment that neither of us had ever been to. I didn’t want anything that had memories in it.
He was already there when I walked in, sitting at a table in the back. He’d lost weight. He hadn’t shaved in a few days. He stood up when he saw me, then didn’t know what to do with his hands, then sat back down.
