Tyler
“Daddy! The toast is burning!”
“Just a minute, Em. Let me—” He jabbed at his phone, silencing it temporarily.
His eight-year-old daughter stood in the kitchen doorway, still in her pajamas despite the bus arriving in twenty minutes.
Her sandy blonde hair — so like his own — stuck out in uneven tufts from a failed ponytail attempt the night before.
The purple circles beneath her eyes mirrored his own.
Neither of them had been sleeping well since Darcy left.
“I’m not wearing that,” Emma declared, pointing at the outfit he’d laid out on the couch. “It’s for babies.”
Tyler took a deep breath, fighting the fog of exhaustion. “Em, please. It’s the clean clothes we have, and we’re already running late.”
“Mom never made me wear baby clothes.” Emma’s bottom lip trembled. The mention of her mother — six months gone to California with her personal trainer — was a knife that never dulled, no matter how many times it struck.
“Your mother isn’t—” Tyler caught himself, swallowing the bitter words. “Please, Emma. For Daddy?”
His phone erupted again. Gerald Parker’s fifth call.
The team owner never called this early unless something was catastrophically wrong.
Tyler’s job as team manager was hanging by an increasingly frayed thread, his distracted performances and late arrivals accumulating in his file like black marks against a future he couldn’t afford to lose.
“I need to take this, sweetie. Can you try to get dressed? Please?”
Emma’s face hardened into a miniature version of Darcey’s when she was angry. Without warning, her arm swept across the counter, sending her cereal bowl crashing to the floor. Milk and soggy cereal spread across the already sticky tiles.
“I HATE THESE CLOTHES AND I HATE THIS HOUSE AND I WANT MOMMY!”
The words slashed across Tyler’s heart, reopening wounds that had barely begun to scab over. His patience, eroded by weeks of similar mornings, finally crumbled.
“ENOUGH!” The word exploded from him with more force than he’d intended.
Emma froze, her eyes widening in shock before filling with tears. In the six months since Darcey had walked out, Tyler had never raised his voice. Not through the nightmares, the tantrums, the parent-teacher meetings where Emma’s teacher delicately suggested “behavioral concerns.”
“Emma, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—”
But she was already gone, her small feet pounding up the stairs. The bedroom door slammed with finality, leaving Tyler standing in a kitchen that smelled of burned toast and failure.
His phone vibrated against the counter. He ignored it, sinking to his knees to clean the spilled cereal, the cold milk seeping through the knees of his khakis.
The photos on the refrigerator — happier times at the rink, Emma on his shoulders after Coyotes games, the three of them at the lake house before everything fell apart — seemed to mock him from their cheerful magnetic frames.
When the phone rang again, it wasn’t Gerald Parker.
Sunny Anderson’s name illuminated the screen, a welcome change in the digital bombardment of his morning. He hesitated, then answered, unable to muster his usual cheery pretense.
“Hey, Sunny.” His voice sounded hollow even to his own ears.
“Tyler? Is this a bad time?” The background noise on her end — children laughing, Liam calling something about hockey gear, the domestic symphony of a functioning family —highlighted the empty silence of his own kitchen, broken only by Emma’s muffled sobs from behind her closed door.
“No, it’s—” The lie died on his lips. “Actually, yes. Everything’s a disaster. Emma’s refusing to get dressed, Gerald’s called five times, and I just screamed at my daughter for the first time since her mother left.” The confession tumbled out before he could stop it.
Sunny’s voice softened. “That’s actually why I’m calling. Liam mentioned things have been… tough.”
Tyler closed his eyes, embarrassment washing over him. His breakdown at the rink last week — confessing to Liam that he was drowning — still stung. The mighty team captain reduced to this: a man who couldn’t manage breakfast without crisis.
“I think I found someone who can help,” Sunny continued. “Her name is Willow Lloyd.”
“A therapist?” Tyler asked, the word bitter on his tongue. The team psychologist had already suggested counseling for both him and Emma.
“No, a nanny. But… she’s more than that.” There was something in Sunny’s tone that made Tyler straighten. “She was a preschool teacher for years, specialized in child psychology. She just got back to Kansas City after some time away.”
“Away where?” Tyler asked, wariness creeping in despite his desperation.
A slight pause. “She didn’t say exactly.
Just that she needed to leave for a while.
But Tyler—” Sunny’s voice lowered, taking on an earnestness that cut through his skepticism.
“She specifically asked about helping your situation when she heard about you through our mutual friend at the children’s center. ”
“She asked about me?” Tyler frowned, puzzled. “Why would she—”
“I think she might understand what Emma’s going through. What you’re both going through. In a way most people can’t.” Sunny hesitated again. “Different circumstances, but… let’s just say she gets it.”
Tyler’s gaze drifted to the stairs where Emma’s sobs had quieted to sniffles.
His daughter’s pain was a living thing in their home, as tangible as the furniture, as persistent as the memories of Darcey that haunted every room.
His own grief he could manage — had been managing, mostly by ignoring it — but Emma’s broke him anew each day.
“I don’t know, Sunny. A stranger in our home…” The idea of exposing their broken little family to outside judgment made his chest constrict.
“Just meet her,” Sunny urged. “No commitment. But Tyler… she’s remarkable with children. And there’s something about her—” She paused. “She sees things others miss.”
Tyler’s phone buzzed with a text from Gerald:
Meeting in 30. Crisis level. Where the Hell are you?
The walls of his carefully constructed facade were crumbling faster than he could patch them. Pride was a luxury he could no longer afford.
“Okay,” he conceded quietly. “Can you give her my number?”
Sunny’s relief was audible. “I already did. Expect her call.” Before hanging up, she added, “Tyler? It’s okay to need help. Trust me on this.”
After ending the call, Tyler stood in the silent kitchen, surrounded by evidence of his failure to keep their lives together. He walked slowly to Emma’s room, resting his forehead against the cool wood of her door.
“Em? I’m sorry I yelled. Can we start over?”
The door opened a crack, revealing Emma’s tear-streaked face. “I miss Mommy,” she whispered, the simple truth that neither of them ever seemed to escape.
“I know, sweetheart.” He knelt to her level, gently smoothing her wild hair. “I miss how things were too.”
Emma leaned into his touch, starved for the comfort he wasn’t sure he was providing adequately. “Are you mad at me? Are you going to leave too?” The question was barely audible, but it might as well have been shouted for the impact it had.
“Never.” Tyler pulled her into his arms, feeling her small body shudder with residual tears. “You’re stuck with me forever, kiddo.”
Over Emma’s shoulder, he spotted the framed photo on her nightstand — Darcey holding a newborn Emma, both of them wrapped in hospital blankets, Tyler beaming beside them.
A family. Before it all fell apart. Before the arguments, before the gradual coldness, before he’d come home one day to find Darcey’s closet empty and a note on the counter:
I need a different life. I’m sorry.
His phone vibrated in his pocket. Another call from Gerald, no doubt. Another crisis he couldn’t solve. Another reminder of how he was failing at every turn.
But cradling his daughter, Tyler made a decision. He would look into this Willow Lloyd. Not because he believed some stranger could fix what was broken in their lives, but because Emma deserved better than what he was managing alone.
As he helped Emma finally get dressed, his mind circled around to Sunny’s words. There’s something about her — she sees things others miss.
Who was this Willow Lloyd? And what dark shadows from her past might help illuminate a path forward for his daughter — and perhaps for himself as well?
Some questions could only be answered by taking a risk…