I recognize it from childhood. From scraped knees and bad dreams and every moment he ever made feel safe just by being there. Dad always said he was meant to be a girl dad. Knowing him, he already thinks he got his wish.
"Dad."
He glances up, and what's in his eyes says he knows I was scared and wants me to know I don't need to be anymore.
"Hey, son." His smile widens, and the tightness in my chest loosens one notch.
She hasn't let go of Dad's hand. Her eyes are on me, bloodshot and glassy, and I forget what I was about to say.
"Callahan." Her voice is hoarse, shot through from crying. She says my name like an apology.
"Hey." One syllable is all I have.
"I'm sorry." Fresh tears spill over her lashes, down her cheeks, and she doesn't wipe them. Doesn't even seem to notice. "The chair shifted and I stumbled and I bumped him and he fell. I'm so sorry, Callahan, I should have been more careful, I should have…"
I can handle most things at this point in my life. Gray eyes full of tears are not on that list, it seems.
"She didn't do anything wrong." Dad's voice cuts through, firm. He squeezes her hand and fixes me with a look that saysfix this.
"The weight moved. Could've happened to anyone. She's been blaming herself since the driveway and she won't hear it from me."
He tips his head toward her, so unsubtle I'm mortified. "Maybe she'll hear it from you."
I stand there as every rule I've built for myself over the last seven months tells me to stay where I am. Keep distance. Closer is dangerous, stupid, will only make things worse. But she's crying and Dad is asking, and the rules don't seem to matter much when she's crying.
I crouch beside her chair, eye level with her now. Closer than I've been since the flower shop. Close enough to see individual lashes clumped together. Close enough to smell something faint under the hospital antiseptic, something that makes my hands want to do things like smooth out her hair and wipe away her tears.
"Eh…Lily." I wait until she looks at me. "It wasn't your fault."
She shakes her head. Stubborn, even now.
"These things happen, okay? He's okay, six to eight weeks, and he'll be back in the workshop driving me crazy."
Her eyes well and spill over, worse than before. My attempt at lightness made it worse. I catch Dad's eye, panicked. He tips his chin toward her, quick and insistent. Twice.Do better.
I'm on my own here.
"You rode with him, stayed with him. That's, ehm…" I swallow. "Very nice of you."
Her chin trembles. She presses her lips together hard, and I watch her fight to hold herself together. I want to touch her face so badly my fingers shake with it.
So I stand and step back.
"Thank you. Uh, for being with him. For staying."
"Of course I stayed." She says it like the alternative doesn't exist in her vocabulary. The easygoing girl who always has mischief in her eyes and never backs down first can't meet my eye.
"I'm going to grab some water," I hear myself say. "Does anyone need anything?"
I need out. I need a break.
"I'm fine, son."
Lily shakes her head, still looking at her lap. I walk out.
I move down the hallway fast, past the nurses' station. A woman in scrubs smiles at me and I smile back because that's what you do, that's what normal people do, and I am a normal person having a normal reaction to a minor family emergency.
There's a door at the end of the corridor that leads to a small courtyard with a bench and a plant in a concrete planter that's seen better decades. Good enough.
