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“Hello?” she called in a small voice as she flipped on a light.
The sight that greeted her made her catch her breath.
Lord above, had he cleaned at all since she’d left?
“Who’s there?” a gruff voice bellowed from the living room. It didn’t really sound like Paul Zukowski, but she knew it couldn’t be anyone else.
Relief swamped her. At least he was alive. “Dad?”
A pause. “Paige?”
Footsteps slugged through the house until he appeared in the opening of the kitchen, grease and sweat stains marring the dingy off-white tank top he wore. His ragged, saggy blue jeans didn’t look any better. A half-empty beer bottle dangled loosely from one hand as if the two had grown attached to each other.
Paige wanted to weep when she saw what he had become. She could remember when he’d been the most hygienic man she’d ever known. He’d had such particular grooming habits; he used to put his hair co
mb in the dishwasher at least once a week to keep it sterilized.
But she found she couldn’t shed a single tear for him.
“What’re you doing here?” he grumbled, eyeing her as if he was trying to figure her out.
Paige forced a smile. “I’m home for Thanksgiving.”
He gave a grunt of acknowledgement and turned away. “Didn’t think you’d come back for that nonsense.”
As he began to shuffle off, she lifted onto her toes. “Kayla invited us to eat with her family this year. I thought you and I could ride over there together.”
He paused but didn’t turn around. She knew good and well that Kayla was his soft spot. “Oh,” he mumbled. “Well. I guess that’d be okay, then.”
Her shoulders relaxed as he left, but she really didn’t feel as if she’d accomplished much. Glancing around the mess that had once been her family kitchen, she blew out a long, tired sigh. Then she rolled up her sleeves and got to work.
After cleaning all of Wednesday from sunup to sundown, trying to put the house back together, Paige was sore and tired, and kind of irritable. She was beyond ready for Thursday to roll around. Still, she climbed out of her childhood bed early to make a dish to bring to the Hashmans’ house for dinner.
When the oven dinged, telling her the pumpkin pie was ready, her father appeared in the doorway. This time, he’d at least attempted to tidy himself. He wore one of the shirts she’d laundered and hung in his closet the day before, and his wet hair was combed sloppily over his bald spot.
“About time to go, is it?”
Paige nodded, feeling a stirring of the doting love she’d once felt for him. She kept glancing at him from the passenger seat of his truck as he drove them to Kayla’s.
“What?” he asked with a scowl when he caught her peeking.
“You need a haircut,” she said, her lips twitching with the desire to smile.
Grumbling something incompressible under his breath, he pulled into the Hashmans’ driveway and slapped at his hair before he got out of the car.
Kayla didn’t wait by the door to greet them; she dashed outside and met them at the truck. It was strange and yet familiar for Paige to hug her. They’d been apart for so long, everything felt different. She still smelled like Kayla’s minty fragrance and felt like Kayla. Except she didn’t.
Kayla clung to her tightly. “You will not believe how much I missed you.”
Then she pulled back to hug Paige’s father. Watching them together, Paige tried to remember the last time she’d hugged him herself. Certainly not since her mother’s death, maybe not even since Trace’s.
She wondered why he could still be affectionate with Kayla and yet his warmth for his own daughter was nonexistent. Maybe he wished she had died instead of Trace. Or instead of her mother.
Tearing her thoughts from such a troubling decline, Paige focused on Kayla’s parents as they stepped outside.
The Hashmans were wonderful, pleasant hosts and made sure to include everyone in every part of the dinner. But Paige still felt disconnected, a spectator more than a participant. She wanted to return to Granton.
After dessert, Kayla hooked her arm through Paige’s and led her back to her room. It looked the same as always, sending a wistful pang of nostalgia through her. She remembered the first time she’d been here. With Trace.
