Chapter 36
THIRTY-SIX
L andyn
I check the clock on the dash. We’re early. Too early. But sitting around the house felt impossible, so instead we’re here, parked outside the Deep Cove Public Library, waiting for the minutes to tick by.
“Mom?” Poppy leans forward as far as her seatbelt will let her. “Can we go inside now?”
I grip the steering wheel and force a calm smile. “Yes, baby. I’m sorry. Let’s go in and find a new book to bring home before story time starts.”
She squints at me like she can tell I’m not myself today, but then shrugs. “Okay. Can I get one with dragons this time?”
“You can get two,” I say, unbuckling her. “Let’s go.”
The library is quiet and bright, with high windows that flood the space with natural light. Poppy immediately makes a beeline for the kids’ section, and I trail after her, heart in my throat. Ford texted me this morning. “I’ll be there. I don’t know what to say yet, but I’ll be there.”
I knew he wouldn’t miss it. Now I just have to believe that it will all be okay. That the truth won’t ruin her—this sweet, sensitive girl with a heart the size of the ocean. It’s always just been the two of us and now I’m about to change everything she’s ever known.
“Do you want to sit over there?” I ask, nodding toward a reading nook at the back of the room next to a wall of windows.
“Sure.” She tucks a picture book under her arm and skips ahead, settling cross-legged in a beanbag chair. I lower myself into the seat across from her, my back to the entrance so I don’t spend the next five minutes watching the door like a crazy person.
But I feel it when he walks in. My body knows his presence before I set eyes on him. I hear the quiet sound of his boots on the polished floor as he approaches us, and then?—
“Hi,” he says, voice low.
Poppy looks up first. Her head tilts. She stares at him like she’s trying to place him.
I turn slowly. Ford’s standing a few feet away, hands shoved in his jean pockets. Uncertainty is written all over his face but he’s still so breathtakingly handsome. His eyes flick to me, then back to Poppy.
“Hi,” I say, voice catching.
Poppy glances between us. “Do you know my mom?”
Ford crouches down slowly, coming to eye-level with her. “I do,” he says. “I’ve known her a long time.”
She studies him, then looks at me. “Is this the friend you said we were meeting?”
My stomach twists. I nod. “Yeah, baby. This is Ford. ”
Ford’s throat moves like he’s trying to swallow the lump in it. “Hi, Poppy.”
She stares at him for another long beat. Then, with perfect, innocent ease, she offers her hand. “Nice to meet you, Ford.”
He smiles, just slightly—but it softens everything about him. He shakes her hand like it’s the most important thing he’s done all day. “Nice to meet you too.”
And just like that, the world shifts beneath us.
Poppy gestures to the chair beside her. “Do you want to read a book with us? It’s about a girl who finds a baby dragon in the forest.”
Ford lowers his six-foot-one body carefully into the seat, and I watch the way his knees fold awkwardly to fit in the kid-sized chair. It’s sweet and a little comical. “I’d love to hear about it,” he says.
Poppy beams and starts flipping through the pages. “Okay, so this is Ember, she’s the dragon, and she’s scared of people, but the girl brings her strawberries and sings to her every day until she’s not scared anymore.”
Ford leans in closer, elbows resting on his knees, eyes on Poppy like no one else exists in the world. “Sounds like a smart girl.”
“She is,” Poppy says, nodding. “And Ember lets her ride on her back, and they fly over the mountains. That’s as far as I got, I haven’t finished it yet.”
“Wow,” Ford says, his smile tugging wider. “You’re really good at telling stories.”
She preens under the compliment, glancing at me. “Mom says I’m a storyteller just like her.”
Ford’s eyes lift to mine. “She’s not wrong.”
There’s a tenderness in his voice I didn’t expect, and I have to look away before the weight of it makes my chest cave in. Poppy leans over and hands the book to Ford. “You read it now.”
He takes it from her gently, glancing over the cover. I can tell he’s nervous by the bob of his Adam’s apple and the faint stutter in his voice. He begins anyways. “Alright, let’s see what Ember’s up to.”
For the next 10 minutes, I sit there in silence and watch the two of them.
Ford’s voice is soft and careful, with just enough playfulness to hold Poppy’s attention.
She laughs at the silly parts. She rests her chin in her hands, taking in every detail.
And Ford watches her like he’s trying to memorize every blink, every giggle, every smile.
Something cracks open in me as I take it all in. A glimpse of what could have been. What still might be. I don’t know what I was expecting, but it wasn’t my broody Ford being so open and natural with a 6-year-old.
When they finish the book, Poppy sighs dramatically. “I wish Ember was real.”
“Me too,” Ford says, handing it back. “I think you’d be a good dragon friend.”
Poppy grins at that. “Do you like dragons, Ford?”
“I do,” he says. “Especially purple ones.”
She giggles and then, out of nowhere, she says, “You have the same eyes as me. They’re gray.”
Ford freezes.
My breath catches.
He doesn’t say anything at first. But then very softly, he says, “Yeah. I guess I do.”
Poppy doesn’t think anything of it. She’s already moved on, busy sorting through the pile of books in the basket beside her. Ford is still staring at her like she just cracked the earth in two.
The librarian announces the start of story time and Poppy takes off running across the room with her usual gusto. She plops down right at the front of the rainbow rug, legs criss-crossed, her little chin tipped up, eyes already wide with anticipation.
“She doesn’t even look back,” Ford murmurs beside me.
“She never does,” I say, smiling. “She loves books more than almost anything. Her imagination is always running wild.”
We both watch as she waves at another little girl, whispers something, then giggles behind her hand. I know Poppy by heart—every mannerism, every expression, but right now I’m seeing her through Ford’s eyes, and it overwhelms me.
“She’s magnetic,” Ford whispers. “She’s at the center of everything.”
I glance at him, heart clenching. “She’s always been like that. Even as a baby. Curious. Fierce. So full of life I could barely keep up.”
He smiles, a real one this time. “She has your mouth.”
“And your eyebrows,” I whisper, letting myself look at him. “And your exact way of narrowing her eyes when she’s thinking too hard.”
His breath catches, and we both just sit and watch her, not speaking for a moment.
“Tell me more about her?” he asks, turning to look at me.
“She has this way of making everything sound like a story,” I tell him, smiling. “The weather. Her dreams. What she had for lunch. She talks like everything matters.”
“She’s…beautiful,” Ford says quietly.
I nod, swallowing past the lump in my throat. “She’s my whole heart. ”
Ford doesn’t speak, but I feel the shift in him, like something inside is slowly rearranging itself, making room.
“I want her to know me,” he says finally.
“She will,” I say. “It will just take time.”
He nods again, slower this time. “You two…she looks so much like you, Lan.”
“I see so much of you, too. Every day. It hasn’t been easy to wake up every morning and see your eyes, the shape of your face, your mannerisms.”
He pulls both hands down his face, shaking his head. I know he must be thinking of all the time he’s lost, of every minute I kept from him. If I had made a different choice years ago, he wouldn’t have to ask me to tell him about his own daughter. He wouldn’t be a stranger to her.
Poppy turns on the rug to grin at us. I wave, and Ford lifts his hand too—a beat late, like he’s still trying to absorb it all.
“She’s going to change your life,” I say softly.
His gaze is still fixed on her, warm and reverent. “I think she already has.”
Then his gray eyes shift to meet mine and he’s the only person in the room.
Everything else fades away until it’s just him and me, tangled in a silence that says everything we’re too afraid to voice out loud.
The space between us feels impossibly charged—full of unsaid things, full of years we can’t get back.
I blink hard, forcing the tears back, and then the librarian closes the book with a soft snap and a dozen little voices erupt with excitement as story time ends. The moment shatters like glass.
Poppy’s head whips around, eyes locking on mine, and she lights up like a sunrise.
She races back, weaving through toddlers and strollers and parents, until she skids to a stop at my side.
“I’m hungry,” she says, clutching her stomach like it’s been days since she last ate rather than an hour or so ago.
I smile, brushing her hair back behind one ear. “Good thing we’ve got your favorite at home: grilled cheese.”
She grins. “With the special cheese?”
“Three kinds. Just for you.”
She nods like that’s the only acceptable number, then looks at Ford, her eyes narrowing in thought. “You should come too,” she announces.
Ford’s eyebrows lift, just slightly. “To try the famous grilled cheese?”
Poppy shrugs. “It’s really good.”
Ford looks at me. Not pushing, just waiting. His expression is tentative. Hopeful.
I nod. “You’re welcome to join us. If you’re not busy…”
“I’m not busy,” he says softly.
Poppy’s already skipping toward the exit, blissfully unaware of the magnitude of this moment. Ford and I fall in step behind her, close but not touching.
“Are you sure, Lan?” he asks suddenly, and I can hear the raw vulnerability in his voice.
“I’m sure.”
We follow her out of the library and into the golden afternoon with something hopeful growing between us. I don’t know what comes next but today feels like a shift. A beginning.