My father picked up on the fourth ring.
“Harper.” His voice still carried that same warmth. Eleven years since everything fell apart, and that part of him had never changed. Every time I heard him say my name, it reminded me exactly why I was doing this.
Right here, I sat on the chair in a room that cost more than he earned in a month. I kept my voice light and asked about his week.
He told me about the neighbor’s dog that waited at his gate every evening. A TV show he had started watching, and a recipe that went wrong when he tried making a dish, which he described with the dry humor I grew up with. For a few minutes, it felt like the most honest conversation I’d had in weeks.
Then he asked, casual as always, if I had met anyone.
I laughed before he even finished the sentence. I gave
