He swallowed. “I don’t know. It’s a very far trip,” he said, rubbing her hair, and he couldn’t help but wonder, as he so often did, if he was doing the right thing by keeping his mother out of Erin’s life. When he had called her against his better judgment to tell her he had gotten his girlfriend pregnant, she used the opportunity to point out all the lives he’d ruined, and how this would just be another one to add to the list. She ended the conversation with, “For God’s sake, I hope you’re going to abort that child.”

And he hadn’t spoken to her since.

But he wondered—if she were to meet Erin, if she got to see how smart and wonderful and kind she was, maybe she would be the kind of grandmother Erin deserved.

Or maybe she’d ruin her, the way she had him.

“What else did Grandma Rose cook?” Erin asked, pulling him back to the present, and he smiled, thankful for the reprieve.

“She made the best zucchini bread,” Michael said, lifting his arm to accommodate her as she snuggled closer to him. “That’s how she tricked me into eating my vegetables.”

“Daddy,” she sing-songed. “Begetables don’t grow in bread!”

Michael laughed. “No, but you can bake them in bread. It tastes delicious. Almost like cake.”

“Can we make zucchini bread?”

“We can try,” he laughed. “I’m not as good as Grandma Rose, but we can certainly try,” he added, turning the page.

“That’s Daddy and his friend at bagruation,” Erin said.

“Graduation,” Michael corrected softly, his eyes on the picture.

“Hey!” Erin squealed, sitting up suddenly, pointing at the picture. “That’s Miss Lauren!”

Michael stared at the picture, although he hardly needed to. He had looked at it so often after he first left Scranton that he could close his eyes and conjure it up with perfect clarity.

He stood several inches taller than her in his black graduation gown, his lips curved into a slight smile as he looked down at her. Lauren leaned into him with one arm extended, holding the camera away from them as she took the a little tighter around herself23so picture. Her head was resting against his chest, her dark red hair spilling over his gown as she smiled at the camera.

Her smile was always his favorite part.

She smiled straight up to her eyes, so happy to be next to him, so proud of him that day. She was the only one who had showed up for him, standing and clapping when his name was called, whistling loudly as he walked across the stage, and taking the one and only picture of him in his graduation attire because, as she had beamed, “Everyone needs to remember their graduation day.”

“Miss Lauren dances with us,” Erin said matter-of-factly as she laid back down.

“Oh yeah?” Michael answered, still lost in the picture.

“Yes. And if someone’s sad, she hugs them. Once, Kayla was crying because she missed her mommy, and Miss Lauren taught her the Brave Song. And then she taught it to everyone. And she promised if we sing it when we’re scared, we’ll feel brave.”

Michael smiled, pulling his eyes from the picture to look down at his daughter. “Didn’t I tell you Miss Lauren was nice?”

“Yes,” she said with a nod. “I think she’s really a princess, but she just forgets to wear her crown.”

“I think so too,” Michael said, and his voice wasn’t as upbeat as he intended; he dropped his eyes and swallowed before turning the page.

“That’s Daddy and Uncle Aaron,” Erin said. “That’s how I got my name. Aaron, Erin. Erin, Aaron,” she sang, moving her shoulders in a little dance beside him.

“That’s right, baby,” he said, forcing a smile. This probably wasn’t the best night to do this; looking at Aaron’s picture on the tail end of looking at Lauren’s was a little more than he could handle just then.

“Uncle Aaron lives in heaven with your Grandma Rose, right Daddy?”

“Right,” he said softly, closing the album, and Erin was too distracted to object.

“And his bed is a cloud and he plays games all day and he eats so much ice cream!” she expounded excitedly.

Michael laughed softly as he stood from the bed. “He has a nice life up in heaven. But he still watches over you. From all the way up there,” he said, pointing up to the ceiling. “He protects you when I’m not around.”

He leaned down and kissed her forehead before he ushered her under the covers and stood, turning on her night-light.

“Did he protect you when you were little too?”

Michael stopped and closed his eyes.

Always, he thought, but instead he said, “Yes, baby girl. Sweet dreams.”

And then he walked out of her room, turning off the light and closing the door, thankful he was able to get out before she could see the look in his eyes.

.

March 1989

Michael sat on his knees at the dinner table, pushing his green beans around on his plate with the hopes of making it look like he’d eaten some.

“Is it time for birthday cake yet?” he asked, thinking of the triple chocolate cake his mother had baked for him.

“Not until those green be his combination locka, glancing up at himans are gone,” his mother called from the kitchen where she was loading the dishwasher.

“Come on buddy, a couple of bites,” his father said from behind him, rubbing his hand over the back of Michael’s head before he walked around the table and sat down next to Aaron.

“Are you excited for your party this weekend?” his brother asked, and Michael grinned and nodded. It was the first party he’d be having with his friends from school, and his mother had booked Jumpin’ Beans gymnasium. It had been the talk of his class for the past few weeks.

“You should be. You’re a big man now. Five years old is a whole hand.” Aaron held up his hand, and Michael leaned forward to slap him high five. Aaron laughed, and Michael grinned proudly as he ate another one of his green beans. Nothing made him happier than when his brother thought he was cool.

“Okay, so what are you working on?” their father asked as he looked over Aaron’s shoulder to see the homework assignment.

“Science, but I don’t know if I’m doing this right.”

“Well, I’ll do my best, but seventh-grade science might be beyond my scope of memory,” he said with a laugh, turning the notebook on the table so he could get a better look. “Oh, hey wait, I think I remember this stuff. Punting Squares, right?”

Aaron laughed. “Punnett Squares.”

“Same difference,” his dad said, playfully punching him on the shoulder, and Michael forced another green bean into his mouth as he watched them.

“We’re doing eye color,” Aaron said. “I have to figure out the possible offspring of two hybrids and two purebreds.”

“Yeah, I remember this,” his father said with a nod. “The dominant gene is represented by a capital letter, and the recessive is lowercase, right?”

“I think,” Aaron said, squinting at his notebook.

“Here,” his father said. “Let’s do the purebred. We’ll use two blue-eyed people. So put two lowercase b’s there, and two more over there,” he added, pointing to the square on Aaron’s page. “Right. Now cross them, and see what you get.”

“Are you done with those green beans yet?” Michael’s mother called from the kitchen.

“Almost,” Michael lied, looking down as he pushed a few more around his plate.

“There, you did it,” his dad said.

“Yeah, but that can’t be right.”

“Why not?”

“‘Cause it says that two blue-eyed people can’t have a brown-eyed baby.”

“Right,” his father said.

“But you and Mom have blue eyes, and look at Michael.”

The sudden silence was what Michael remembered the most. It was so abrupt that he looked up from his plate, because to him it seemed like everyone in the room suddenly disappeared.

And then he saw his brother’s face, and he was suddenly afraid without understanding why. It was the same face Aaron wore when he’d accidentally ridden his bike too close to their mother’s new car in the driveway and scratched the side: a pathetic mixture of fear and guilt.