Page 256 of Merciless Daddy

Suspicious. Very suspicious.

His watch was gone from the bedside table. His phone was gone. His clothes from the previous night had been folded over the chair with the precision of a man who believed disorder was the first stage of national collapse.

Even more suspicious.

I found the firebird notebook on my nightstand.

It had become thicker in six months. Not because I had suddenly turned into a woman overflowing with innocent hopes. I still wrote practical things by accident.

Replace warehouse manager at northern facility.

Review pension exposure.

Find out whether Donatella actually has human emotions.

Sal had drawn a line through the first two and added a question mark beside the third.

The pages about wants looked different. I’d stuck paper in, added extra envelopes and pouches. A long list of things, started so long ago.

I want another date.

Crossed out.

I want a home with you.

Crossed out.

I want Kiryl to choose what he studies.

Crossed out after he enrolled in a business program, dropped one accounting course after two weeks, and announced that economics was invented to punish decent people.

I want my mother’s companies back.

Crossed out.

I want to stop waking afraid.

Not crossed out.

Not completely.

But underneath it I had written:

Most mornings are good.

That counted for something.

The bedroom door opened, and Sal came in carrying a breakfast tray.

He wore dark trousers and a white shirt with the sleeves rolled to his forearms. No jacket. No tie. His hair was still damp. A few silver threads at his temples caught the sun.

The tray held coffee, toast, strawberries, eggs, and enough food for a woman preparing to cross Siberia on foot.

I looked from the tray to him.

“What did you do?”

“Good morning to you too.”