with both hands pressed against completely dry cheeks.
Mom had already given her my flowers.
“They make her feel better,” she explained.
I turned toward Dad.
The restaurant reservation was still open on his phone.
“You’re actually canceling?”
He gave me that familiar exhausted look.
The one that always meant Claire, be reasonable so Madison doesn’t have to be.
“It’s only one dinner.”
Only one dinner.
Those words landed differently that night.
Because it had never been only one dinner.
My high school graduation celebration became a dinner for Madison’s
