Chapter 8: One More Day
The next morning, Daniel arrived at eight with coffee for me and a paper bag of pastries.
Sophie was already dressed.
She had chosen her outfit with unusual deliberateness — her yellow shirt, her white shorts, her sandals with the buckles she usually asked me to do for her.
She did them herself that morning.
"I'm ready," she announced, when Daniel knocked.
He looked at her standing there in her yellow shirt, ready and serious and six years old, and he smiled.
It was the first full smile I had seen from him.
It changed his face.
"So am I," he said.
I watched them walk down to the beach from the window.
He carried her on his back through the soft sand near the dunes, where it was harder to walk.
She held on with both arms around his neck, pointing at things — a bird, a boat far out on the water, a piece of driftwood shaped like a horse.
He looked at everything she pointed at.
I went down later and sat in a beach chair at the edge of the water while they played.
Sophie found a shell and brought it to him.
"Is this a good one?" she asked.
He turned it over in his hands.
"Very good.
See the color on the inside?
That's called nacre."
"Nay-ker," she repeated carefully.
"Exactly."
"What does it mean?"
"It's what makes the inside of a shell shine.
It's the same thing pearls are made of."
Sophie held the shell up to the light.
"So there might be a pearl inside?"
"This one's too small.
But somewhere out there—" He pointed at the ocean.
"There are oysters right now making pearls, and they don't even know it."
Sophie thought about this.
"That's nice," she said.
"Making something beautiful without knowing."
He looked at her for a moment.
"Yes," he said.
"It is."
That afternoon, while Sophie napped, Daniel reached into his jacket pocket and set something on the table between us.
It was a small notebook, battered at the corners.
"What is this?" I said.
"I've been writing things down," he said.
"Since the diagnosis.
Things I wanted her to know.
Stories.
Things I remember.
Things I hope for her." He paused.
"I want her to have it.
But I also want you to read it first.
So you know what's in it."
I looked at the notebook.
"You can give it to her when you think she's ready," he said.
"Or not at all.
That's your call.
It always will be."
I picked it up.
It was heavier than it looked.
"How much is in here?" I said.
"About two years' worth," he said quietly.
"I started it before I knew I was sick.
I just — I used to think about her.
Late at night.
I'd write things down."
I set the notebook on my side of the table.
"I'll read it," I said.
He nodded.
Sophie appeared in the doorway of the bedroom, hair flattened on one side from sleep, the necklace still on.
"Is it time to go back to the beach?" she said.
"Almost," Daniel said.
"Come here first.
I want to tell you something."
She padded over and stood in front of him.
"I have to go home tomorrow," he said.
"But I want you to know that I'm going to call you.
Every week.
And when you get back from this trip, I'd like to come and visit you properly.
Meet your grandpa.
See where you live."
Sophie looked at him carefully.
"Do you promise?" she said.
"I promise."
She studied his face for a long moment, the way she had studied him at the door on the first day — measuring, weighing.
Then she put her arms around his neck and hugged him.
His eyes closed.
His arms came up around her slowly, like he was afraid of breaking something.
May you like
"Okay," she said into his shoulder.
"I believe you."
