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“If you didn’t fire Katie then why did she have to go?” Charlie asked.

“She wanted to live with her boyfriend.” It was the simplest explanation Eli could come up with for what had happened.

“Oh,” Charlie said. “Why couldn’t her boyfriend come and live with us here?”

“I don’t think they really wanted to do that,” Eli said. “And we didn’t really want to do that either. We didn’t want to invite him to live here.”

“Is he a bad guy?”

“No, I’m sure he’s fine. It’s just that this is our house, not a home for Katie and everyone she wants to live with. We had her here aslong as she was working for us, but she’s ready to move on and do other things now. And that’s okay.”

“Is she going to marry her boyfriend?”

“I don’t know,” Eli said. “She didn’t tell me. Maybe she will.”

“And maybe she’ll have kids.”

“I guess. She didn’t tell me that either.”

“I hope she does. Maybe I could be friends with her kids someday.”

“Maybe,” Eli agreed, knowing full well that Charlie would forget all about that idea in a matter of weeks. There was no need to argue with him about it right now.

“Well,” Charlie said. “I guess that’s all right, then.”

“Yeah? That’s okay with you?”

“Yeah, I want Katie to get married if that’s what she wants,” Charlie said. “I hope we get to go to the wedding.”

Eli hummed noncommittally.

“Dad?”

“Yeah?”

“Do you think you’ll ever get married?”

It wasn’t the first time Charlie had asked that question. He was aware that his parents hadn’t been married, even though he didn’t have any real memories of his mother. Fiona had died in an accident when Charlie was only two years old.

“I don’t know, kid,” Eli said. “Seems to me our family is pretty good as it is, don’t you think?”

“I mean, yeah,” Charlie agreed. “It’s good.”

“So why would I want to get married?”

Charlie shrugged his shoulders and set about breaking his cookie into quarters, a habit he had to make his snacks seem to last longer.

Eli watched his son and pondered the question Charlie had asked him. Would he ever get married?

Honestly, he couldn’t imagine it happening.

He was barely able to keep his head above water as it was, and that was going to get even more difficult now that Katie had left. The responsibilities of his job kept him so busy that he barely had time to be a father to his son. Kate had been right about that, though he didn’t like to admit it — he felt a lot of guilt over the fact that he had to spend so much of his time at work, and that he wasn’t able to be with Charlie.

But he was all his son had. Fiona’s death meant that Charlie was alone in the world apart from him. Eli and Fiona had never had a romantic relationship, but they had been wonderful coparents, and Eli missed having her around.

He knew he would never marry, though. As much as he had enjoyed coparenting, he just couldn’t see how he would ever balance all the different sides of his life with a romantic relationship. When would he find the time to go on dates? It couldn’t be done.

“You’d better get back to bed, kid,” he told Charlie. “You’re up way past your bedtime.”