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Just like you are?

“Hannah!” Remy exclaimed from beside me, startling me out of my distracted fog.

Remy ran up to her big sister, who’d emerged from the front door of the restaurant, and threw her arms around her. My heart swelled.

“Hey kiddo,” Hannah said.

Remy snorted as she pulled away. “Kiddo yourself!”

I shook the lingering thoughts of Michelle from my brain, reaching down to pull my girl into a hug.

“Hey Ms. Banana,” I said. “Let’s have some spaghetti.”

* * *

Antonio’s FamousSpaghetti House hadn’t changed one bit since Jill and I used to come here a lifetime ago. As we stepped through the bell-clanging door into the familiar space, I was hit with nostalgia. It wasn’t like the first time I’d come back when I’d been bitter and angry at Jill. Now, it was just something old and familiar. The red-checkered tablecloths, dim lighting, and framed prints of bucolic Italian scenes hadn’t changed since the first time I’d walked in. I knew digging into one of Antonio’s famously oversized oval-shaped plates piled high with noodles and meatballs the size of my fists would cure whatever ailed me.

After we’d placed our orders and were sipping our drinks—sodas all around, given I had to drive from the train station back to Jewel Lakes on potentially slippery roads later tonight—I leaned back in my seat.

“I’m going to miss you guys over Christmas,” I said, looking at each of my daughters. Soon, both of them would be having their own Christmases, with their own families. And where would I be?

“You already miss me,” Hannah said. She smiled, tucking her long brown hair behind her ear.

If she weren’t my beloved firstborn she might be tough to look at. She was the spitting image of Jill at her age, except with my mom’s eyes and cheekbones. The combination of looking at Jill and my Mom, two women I’d loved who were no longer in my life, might have stung. But Hannah was her own person. A good, sweet girl who seemed to always know what to say or do—particularly when it came to her little sister.

“Don’t worry,” Remy said, “We’ll see you next year!”

I clapped my hands over my chest. “Nextyear!”

Jill had requested she keep the girls all the way through New Year’s this time, in exchange for me getting March Break. At eighteen, Hannah was old enough that she didn’t have to partake in any of the custody arrangements, but she went along with them anyway, for Remy’s sake. “It’s easier this way,” she’d said to me when she turned eighteen.

That was Hannah, agreeable as ever and always thinking about her sister.

“So where precisely is this place your mother’s taking you again?” I asked.

“Dad,” Hannah said. I couldn’t tell if her voice was warning or pleading. I knew perfectly well where they were going—Jill’s new boyfriend’s parents’ place. Or their summer home, down in Florida.

“It’s not even going to be that hot,” Remy said.

“Or that close to the beach,” added Hannah.

I smiled. “I appreciate you guys keeping me from being too jealous,” I said.

“We’ll be back before you know it,” Hannah said.

After Hannah had caught us up with everything about her first few months at school, Remy announced she had to go to the bathroom. She said it abruptly, sliding out of her seat without looking at us. But instead of heading to the back of the restaurant where the restrooms were located, she made a beeline for the entrance.

“Draco?” Hannah asked, sipping her Coke.

“They’ve been bickering the whole way here,” I said, pulling apart a piece of garlic bread. “I think she knows I’m sick of it. I’m glad to hear school’s going well, but hell, I wish you were around Hannah, just to show her what a normal relationship looks like. How’s Geoff, by the way?”

Hannah took another sip of soda, not saying anything.

My stomach sank. “Oh no…”

“It’s okay—it was too tough doing the long-distance thing, you know?” Her voice had a falsely chipper note. “Anyway Mom says I’m too young to get involved with anyone so seriously. That I should have fun—be wild and free, she says.” Hannah rolled her eyes slightly at that last bit.

But I felt as if I’d been punched in the gut. One of the biggest, ugliest albatrosses in Jill’s and my marriage was my suspicion that Jill wished she hadn’t gotten together with me so young. Or maybe that she wished we hadn’t gotten together at all.