Page 92 of His Daughter

I stood barefoot in the kitchen in a T-shirt and joggers, Lena on my hip. She was bigger now. Heavier. Her hands grabbed at everything within reach — the cabinet handle, the edge of the counter, my collar, which she pulled with a strength that was genuinely alarming for a baby who weighed fifteen pounds.

She babbled while I poured, a constant stream of vowels and consonants, as if she was rehearsing several languages simultaneously and hadn't picked one yet.

"Da," she said. She slapped my chest.

"Good morning to you, too."

"Ba da." She grabbed my ear.

"That's my ear. You have your own."

She pulled. I gently detached her fingers and bounced her on my hip while the machine finished.

Two cups. The dark roast. Thea’s setting.

Her mug was the green one. I set it on the right side of the counter, where she always stood. A ring stain from yesterday's cup left a mark on the marble beside it. She never used the coasters. I stopped caring about that three weeks ago, about the same time I stopped caring about the state of the countertops, the organization of the refrigerator, and the structural integrity of my bookshelves, which now held more romance novels than biographies.

The shoebox containing her grandmother's faded, oil-stained recipe cards sat at the counter's end — brought last week, positioned just so by Thea. Soft cardboard, the last piece of her old life merging here. Proof she was staying.

Lena grabbed for the shoebox. I redirected her hand to a teething ring. She examined it, rejected it, and went back to the shoebox.

"Not that one, sweetheart. Those are important."

"Ba."

"More important than ba."

She shoved the teething ring in her mouth and stared at me with Thea's expression.

Thea’s laptop was open on the counter — emails visible, including a fourteen-reply chain with Margot. Thea now worked at the nonprofit three days a week. Mrs. Parrish watched Lena during those days; Dominique covered late evenings. Mornings were chaotic with rushed handoffs in the hallway. Some nights, I came home to Dominique and Lena with books, Thea’s coat on the hook, and her singing from the bathroom as she ran Lena’s bath, still in her work clothes.

It was ours.

Footsteps in the hallway. Bare feet on hardwood. Thea came around the corner. She was in my gray T-shirt. It hung past her thighs. Her hair was down, still pressed flat on one side from the pillow. The gold studs in her ears.

She walked past me. Her hand trailed across my back as she passed. She went straight for the coffee, picked up the green mug, took a sip, and closed her eyes.

She made that same low sound every morning — half hum, half sigh — the sound of the first good thing in her day. That I was the one who made it, pouring her coffee and setting it where she always stood, meant something I'd stopped trying to put into words.

She opened her eyes and saw Lena on my hip. Lena saw Thea.

The full-body lean. Immediate. Lena's arms went out, reaching, her torso tilting so far toward Thea that I had to tighten my grip to keep her from launching herself off my hip. Her hands opened and closed in the air. It meant only one thing — I want her.

Thea set the mug down and took her. Lena curled in. Thea's arm went under her automatically. Her hand cupped the back of Lena's head. She swayed once, twice, the reflex so deep it happened before thought.

I watched them. My daughter was on the hip of the woman who chose her before I did. The woman who opened her door very late at night, picked up a stranger's baby, and didn't let go.

The penthouse looked the same, but it smelled different — shea butter, lavender, the warmth of a kitchen used often and badly. Romance novels filled the shelves. The nursery's rocking chair bore the dent of Thea's body. The bathroom held two toothbrushes, hand cream, and a hair tie on the faucet that I stepped over each morning and never moved.

She changed what it meant.

"I found a house," I said. I leaned against the counter beside her. "Brownstone. Brooklyn. Three bedrooms. A yard."

She looked at me over Lena's head. The eyebrow.

"It has a porch."

"A porch."