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I wasn’t late for dinner, so what was this about?

Wait.

My stomach dropped.

Did he know about Reed being with me when I left the stadium last night? Shit. I was so about to be grounded.

I stepped out of the Jeep, swallowing over grittiness when he laughed. “Relax, Eliza,” he said. “You look like you’re walking to your doom.”

“Am I?”

“I noticed your spare tire on the Jeep. How many times do I have to tell you to drive the BMW? When did you get the flat?” he asked.

Oh. “After the game.”

“Well, I’m glad Triple A was able to help you. We’ll take it in for a new tire this—”

“I changed it myself,” I said, leaving out the part where Reed was there too.

He rubbed his chin. “Who taught you how to change a flat?”

“TJ.” Because you were too busy to show me, remember?

He nodded approvingly before he pulled out his North Face backpack, the old hiking one, from the back of his truck. “I thought maybe we’d hit a couple trails today before dinner. You know…like we used to.”

Dad and I hadn’t hiked in over five years. What the heck brought this idea into his head? Maybe his therapist?

“Eliza?” Dad returned his backpack to the back of his truck. “Hike? Today?”

“Dad, I don’t know if now’s a good time. I came home for a snack, and then I wanted to go back to the theater for some cue work while the cast wasn’t there.” I flicked my keys back and forth in my hand.

“Come on. You can spare one afternoon for a walk with your old man.” He made a pouting face—no one had a pout like his.

Dammit. “Okay, fine. Let me go get my old sneakers.”

A half an hour later, Dad parked the truck at the Chestnut Oak and Swift Creek Loop Trail. We used to walk this every Sunday evening together, just the two of us. Mulched, shaded pathways looped around the tall trees, and in areas where the overgrowth was too thick or where the ground sank too low, wooden planks turned the path into more of a boardwalk. The trail even had benches and lookout posts. I used to love coming here in the late spring and summer when everything was in bloom, but my favorite time to visit was always the winter, when it was still.

I felt as much reverence for winter in the woods as I did in church, maybe more so.

“Swift Creek or Beech Tree Trail?” Dad asked me as he tightened the straps of his pack on his shoulders.

“Swift Creek.” I had forgotten to put on bug spray, so Swift Creek’s boardwalk paths would be a safer bet.

The first half of our walk was taken by silence, but not an uncomfortable one, with Dad in front of me. I picked up a fallen branch and broke off the twigs to use as a walking stick. Dad had his binoculars out and stopped to scan the trees every so often. Chipmunks scurried under the ferns along the path and squirrels raced effortlessly up and down the trees. Sunlight filtered in through the leaves high above, tinting the path in different shades of green. With a bit more blue, this kind of lighting would be perfect for the balcony scene.

“So your mother tells me your show is going well,” Dad said, pausing to lift his binoculars toward a tall oak.

Did she? Half the time I talked about it, I wasn’t sure she heard me. “It is. Kinda.”

“What do you mean, ‘kinda’?”

I ran my stick back and forth over the boards. “It’s nothing I can’t handle. Just had a run in with a couple of chauvinistic jerks this morning—”

“Do I need to go down there?” Dad’s binoculars smacked against his chest, his hands now resting on his hips.

“No.” I smiled. It was nice to see him stand up for me like this. It had been a while. “I took care of it and set them straight.”

He beamed and patted my shoulder. “That’s my girl.”