Daisy
After catching a connecting flight in Toronto, the plane touches down in Regina with a soft, almost apologetic bump, and the first thing I notice is how quiet everything feels. Serene, even. We’re a long way from New York City.
No lines of aircraft stacked nose to tail. No frantic taxiing or skyline pressing up against the windows. Just flat land stretching outward in every direction, pale and endless beneath a washed-out prairie sky.
This is Saskatchewan.
I don’t know what I expected—some cinematic, snow-globe version of a small town, maybe—but the airport is modest and utilitarian, more functional than charming.
One terminal. One baggage carousel. A handful of people waiting with coats already zipped and hats pulled low.
There’s a charm to it all, even though I know this part of the country can be unforgiving.
Grizz and I move through the small airport, wheeling our carry-on luggage behind us. I let Grizz lead the way. I’m nervous, but I try hard not to let it show. This isn’t my family or my history. This isn’t my weight to carry, but I’m here to support Grizz, and I intend to be steady.
Beside me, Grizz seems anything but. His shoulders are locked, posture rigid in a way I’ve come to recognize. Every internal wall he’s built is up and reinforced.
We step out onto the curb and the air is far colder than New York. I glance at Grizz, but he’s already scanning the area.
Then I see her. A pretty woman with short brown hair, jumping out of a small white sedan pulled up to the curb. She glances at me and smiles but first moves straight to her brother with the trace of tears already in her bright blue eyes. “James,” she exclaims with clear relief to see him.
I startle at the use of his real name, smiling as she wraps her arms around him like she’s been holding herself together purely for this moment. The sound that leaves her chest is half laugh, half sob. Grizz stiffens on instinct, then folds into her, arms coming up around her back.
I take a small step to the side, giving them space, suddenly aware of my presence during this intimate family moment.
Eliza pulls away just enough to look at him, hands still gripping his jacket. Then her eyes flick to me.
Grizz clears his throat, already uncomfortable. “Uh—El,” he says, gesturing vaguely in my direction. “This is Daisy. She’s… PR from the team.”
I blink.
“Uh, okay, Grizz,” I say, meeting Eliza’s gaze. “I’m a little more than that, and we both know it.”
Grizz groans quietly under his breath, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck. Does he think he’s already lost control of the situation?
Eliza, on the other hand, lights up. Her face softens, her mouth curving into a warm, surprised smile as she steps closer. “Oh,” she says, eyes going between me and her brother. “Well. I’m very glad you came.”
She offers me a hug—easy, genuine, welcoming—and I let myself return it, relieved by the uncomplicated kindness of it.
“I’m Eliza,” she adds. “Thank you for being here.”
“Of course,” I say. “I’m really glad I could come.”
When I glance back at Grizz, he looks like a man who’s already completely out of his depth, caught between his sister, his past, and a present he didn’t plan for.
But to my delight, he doesn’t look angry about it. He just looks… exposed.
Eliza insists I take the front seat. “Grizz is brooding so he can ride in the back,” she says lightly as she pops the trunk. “Which is… often.”
“Hey,” Grizz mutters from behind us. “That’s not—”
“It’s exactly true,” she cuts in, smiling. I like her already.
I slide into the passenger seat and she pulls out of the tiny airport lot, the road opening into long, quiet stretches. Flat land. Big sky. Ahead of us sits a horizon that makes me feel very small.
“So,” Eliza says. “What do you think of Saskatchewan so far? Have you ever been here?”
I laugh. “First time and I don’t think I’ve been anywhere this quiet since… ever.”
She grins. “Give it an hour. The wind picks up and suddenly it sounds like the world is trying to argue with you.”
From the back seat, Grizz shifts. “It’s not that dramatic.”
Eliza snorts. “You say that because you grew up here.”
We fall into easy conversation. The topics move seamlessly between work, travel, the shock of prairie winters, the way Saskatchewan weather seems personally offended by optimism.
Eliza tells a story about a snowstorm that shut down the town for three days.
I counter with tales of New York transit that sound just as apocalyptic in a different way.
“It’s funny,” she says at one point, smiling at me. “Grizz never talks about what he does off the ice beyond ‘PR stuff’ and ‘meetings.’”
I raise a brow. “That’s Grizz.”
“He hates logistics,” she adds. “Always has.”
From the back seat, Grizz exhales loudly. “I don’t hate logistics. I hate unnecessary logistics.”
Eliza laughs. “You mean, like, planning.”
“I mean like overthinking.”
She shoots me a look that says good luck, and somehow it feels like we’re already aligned. The conversation flows so naturally it almost startles me—like we’ve skipped all the awkward getting-to-know-you steps and landed in familiar territory.
There’s a beat of silence before she resumes talking—to me. “So, Daisy, you’ll see pretty quickly why people underestimate how cold it gets here. They think snow is snow until it’s minus thirty and your eyelashes freeze.”
I smile, following her lead, answering, laughing lightly. And I can feel Grizz behind us, bristling, unsettled by how easily she keeps the conversation going, how little effort it takes for her to include me.
A few minutes pass before Eliza speaks again, quieter this time, directing it to Grizz without fully turning around. “He may not know who you are at first,” she says gently. “Or at all. Just… be prepared.”
I reach back without thinking, fingers finding Grizz’s hand between the seats.
I wait a moment to see if he’ll accept and when his fingers intertwine with mine, I squeeze once—nothing dramatic but enough to ensure he knows I’m here for him.
For a second, I think he might pull away, retreat behind the walls I know so well.
Instead, his fingers tighten around mine briefly.
He doesn’t say thank you, but he doesn’t let go either.
It’s about a twenty-minute drive before we pull into a large parking lot outside a low-slung redbrick building with a sign that says Pilot Butte Assisted Living Facility. Eliza parks and we enter.
The halls are bright and lined with framed photographs of prairie sunsets and laminated signs printed in friendly fonts. Memory Care Unit is written everywhere in reassuring blues and greens, as if color alone could soften what it means to end up here.
The closer we get to the room, the tenser Grizz becomes. His shoulders draw in and his steps slow. It’s obvious he dreads what’s coming. He doesn’t say anything, but every instinct in me recognizes it for what it is… fear.
I stay close without touching him. Close enough that he knows I’m there. Not close enough to crowd.
Eliza stops outside a door halfway down the hall. She rests her hand on the handle, then pauses. Takes a breath that trembles slightly before she reins it back in and composes herself.
“Okay,” she says softly and opens the door.
Their father is sitting on the edge of the bed, hands folded neatly in his lap, staring out the window. He looks older than I expected, thinner and frailer somehow, his shoulders sloped forward, a man whose life has seen better days.
He turns at the sound, eyes moving over Eliza. Over Grizz. Over me.
A polite smile lifts his mouth, uncertain but pleasant. “Can I help you?” he asks.
Grizz breaks internally. I can feel it in the sudden stillness of him, the way he seems to retreat inside his own body. His face gives nothing away.
Eliza’s smile falters for a fraction of a second before she recovers. “Hi, Dad,” she says gently.
He nods at her, courteous. Then his gaze drifts to me and brightens.
“Well now,” he says, eyes sharpening with interest. “Aren’t you pretty?”
I blink, surprised.
He chuckles to himself. “They’re hiring prettier nurses these days.” He lowers his voice conspiratorially. “Good strategy.”
Eliza flushes crimson. “Dad—”
“It’s okay,” I say quickly, stepping forward a little. I keep my tone warm, respectful, easy. “I’m Daisy. I’m just here with them.”
“With them,” he repeats, testing it. “Well, lucky me.”
Eliza lets out a shaky breath, and I catch her eye, offering a small smile that says It’s fine. She nods, grateful.
I don’t know what triggers it—maybe I say Grizz’s name without thinking, maybe it’s the cadence of the room—but his father’s expression suddenly changes. His eyes widen, light flooding back into them like a switch has been flipped.
“James!” he exclaims, delighted. “My boy!” Grizz flinches and takes a step back. “There you are,” his father continues warmly. “Come here. Let me tell you—God, I was just thinking about you.”
He launches into a speech as if he’d been rehearsing it.
“Remember when we used to go fishing up at the lake every summer? You were so patient, even as a kid. Always had that focus.” He laughs. “And your birthdays—your mother and I never missed one. Balloons everywhere. You always wanted chocolate cake.”
It sounds beautiful, the flood of memories pouring out, and this is exactly the type of welcome I know Grizz needs.
His father keeps going, voice thick with pride. Stories of cheering in cold rinks, of encouraging talks after hard games, of a childhood full of warmth and presence and love. A father who showed up.
I glance at Eliza who’s worrying at her lower lip, then to Grizz, expecting a reaction. Maybe a smile. Some type of acknowledgment.
Instead, he looks angry.
His responses are clipped, almost brutal in their restraint.
“Yeah.”
“Sure.”
“Mm.”
His father doesn’t seem to notice as he beams at Grizz, utterly pleased with himself.
“And then—” His father frowns. “What was I saying?” Confusion clouds his face. The warmth drains away as quickly as it came. “Who are you?” he asks suddenly, agitation creeping in. “Why are you all standing here?”
His hands clench and his breathing quickens. Eliza steps in instinctively, smoothing her voice and touching his arm. “It’s okay, Dad,” she says. “You’re safe. You’re just tired and could use some rest, yeah?”
“I am a little tired,” he admits.
A nurse appears at the doorway, and together she and Eliza coax him back toward the bed, redirecting, calming, grounding him. It’s natural to Eliza, like this is a language she knows how to speak. She almost appears more fluent in the ways of the nurse than the nurse herself.
Grizz, on the other hand, doesn’t move. His face is devoid of any expression as Eliza helps to fluff her dad’s pillow and pours a cup of water for him to sip on.
Abruptly, Grizz pivots and walks out of the room without a word, footsteps heavy against the linoleum.
And I know without needing to look that he’s reached his limit.
Eliza and I exchange a look and she nods toward the door, a silent request that I follow him.
He’s already halfway down the hall when I catch up, his strides long and angry. I call his name once, but he doesn’t stop until we’re outside the unit, the door swinging shut behind us with a muted click.
“Grizz.” He turns then, his body coiled, eyes too bright, putting me on edge. I step closer. “Are you okay?”
“No, I’m not fucking okay,” he growls. “What a fucking farce!”
I frown, reaching to touch his forearm. “I don’t understand. You got something good in there. A real moment of connection. I know it was hard, but—you should be grateful for the pieces you still get.”
The words barely leave my mouth before I see they land wrong. He stares at me like I’ve just missed the entire point of what’s been tearing him apart for years. “I didn’t get a goddamn thing in there except history rewritten.”
“But—” I gesture over my shoulder, back toward his room. “Those stories…”
“They weren’t real,” he says. His voice isn’t loud. It’s gutted. “None of those memories happened.”
I blink, thrown completely off balance. “What?”
“The fishing trips. The birthdays.” He shakes his head once, dismissive. “None of it.”
I open my mouth, then close it again.
“There were no fishing trips. There were no tender bonding moments between father and son. What I remember mostly is that he made me skate until I threw up,” he says, the words clipped and raw. “Over and over. When he rammed into my ten-year-old brain that pain and suffering meant progress.”
My stomach drops.
“If I lost a game, he locked me out of the house,” he continues. “Middle of winter. Told me champions don’t come home losers.”
I feel dizzy.
“He broke a stick over my back once,” he adds flatly. “Split it clean. Said it was my fault for being weak.”
My breath catches audibly now, but he keeps going.
“He told me if I cried, I’d never be good enough.
That toughness was the only thing that mattered.
” His eyes move away for half a second, then back to me.
“So don’t tell me to be grateful for lies.
Those stories are easier for him because he doesn’t have to remember what he actually did.
He’s got the benefit of living in la-la land. ”
I’m horrified. My skin feels too tight and my chest burns. I can’t reconcile the gentle man in that room with the father he’s describing, and the worst part is knowing both versions exist in the same body.
“It’s just… it’s not fair,” he says. “I know he’s sick and I know he needs help, but the reality is, he treated me like shit my entire childhood, and now I’m still dealing with the scars and as far as he’s concerned, there’s nothing but rose-colored history.”
He falters, and for a moment, I sense he might even shed a tear. I step into Grizz fast and wrap my arms around his torso, hard, pressing my face into his chest like I can anchor him there by force alone. It’s not delicate or cautious.
It’s desperate and instinctive.
For a second, he freezes. Arms locked at his sides, breath shallow, like his body doesn’t know what to do with comfort when it isn’t earned through endurance.
Then—slowly—he exhales. His shoulders sag a fraction. His hands lift, hesitant, unsure, before settling against my back. One arm comes around me, then the other, and he pulls me in.
Just enough to let his weight rest against mine, like he’s borrowing my steadiness because he’s run out of his own. His forehead drops toward my hair, his grip tightening. It doesn’t come off as possessive but rather needed.
And for this one moment, he lets himself be mine.
I hold him and don’t say a word.
I don’t try to fix it. I don’t offer perspective or silver linings or gratitude for what remains. I just stay, arms locked around him, heart breaking open wide enough to hold everything he’s never been allowed to put down.
And I know, with absolute certainty, that I want to help him mend these scars.
And I will.