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.

She came in through the back door in her warmup jacket. Her braid half undone. Smelling like

pepperoni and the gym.

She stopped when she saw us at the table.

She looked at the rose.

Then she walked over and did something she hadn’t done since she was ten years old.

She sat down on Travis’s knee.

Like a little girl.

She’s five foot ten. She’s a middle hitter. She didn’t fit on his knee at all.

It didn’t matter even a little bit.

“I put my phone away during the party,” she said. “Everybody kept showing me the video.

Somebody already put it on Facebook. Grandpa has four hundred likes.”

Travis laughed. It came out wet.

“Your grandpa doesn’t even know what Facebook is.”