My husband refused to walk my 17-year-old daughter, his stepdaughter for nine years, at her high school senior night. “That’s something a real father should do,” he told her. But when her name was announced Thursday evening, her 79-year-old grandfather appeared with his walking cane and proudly accompanied her onto the court.

We left it.

We didn’t talk about it in the truck on the way home.

Mason fell asleep against the window before we even got to the edge of town. Kaylee rode with

her friends to the team’s pizza party at Casey’s.

Travis drove with both hands on the wheel. The rose lay on the dashboard, rolling a little on the curves.

He didn’t say a word for eleven miles.

Neither did I.

When we got home, I carried Mason up to bed and came back down.

Travis was sitting at the kitchen table. In the same chair he’d been sitting in on Tuesday.

The rose was lying in front of him on the oilcloth.

I put on a pot of decaf.

I didn’t ask him anything.