“Scared of what?”
He hesitated.
“That someday you’d tell me I wasn’t really your dad.”
Kaylee stared at him as though he’d said something completely absurd.
“Travis, who taught me how to braid my hair?”
He smiled through his tears.
“I did.”
“Who drove me to volleyball practice when Mom was working?”
“Me.”
“Who built my practice net?”
“I did.”
She rested her head against his shoulder.
“Then why would you think you aren’t my dad?”
I stood and walked toward the kitchen sink because I couldn’t stop crying.
The next morning, Dad called to ask whether we’d placed the rose in water.
Travis immediately trimmed its stem and put it in a glass jar on the windowsill.
It lasted nine days.
My father considered that quite impressive for an October flower.
Travis never gave another public speech about being Kaylee’s father.
He wasn’t that kind of man.
But his behavior changed in small, meaningful ways.
