Chapter Ten
PURPLE DRESS
Zayden
Sienna is late.
Not by much—fifteen minutes—but Maisie has been standing by the window for the past hour, watching every car that passes as if it might be the one.
She’s wearing the purple dress she picked out herself, the one with the sparkles on the sleeves, and she brushed her hair herself this morning, even though it took her twenty minutes and the part is crooked.
She wanted to look pretty for her mom.
I wanted to cancel this whole thing. I’m pretending to read the newspaper at the kitchen table, but the words blur together. I haven’t turned a page in twenty minutes.
“She’s here!” Maisie’s voice is bright and hopeful, and it hits me right in the chest. She’s already running for the door before I can say anything, and I follow, bracing myself for whatever version of Sienna is about to walk into our lives.
The answer: Instagram Sienna.
She steps out of an Uber looking like she’s about to walk a red carpet.
Hair perfectly styled, makeup flawless, outfit probably straight from her latest haul video—looking like she spent more time getting ready than she will spend here with Maisie today.
She’s holding her phone in one hand—already filming, I realize—and she crouches down as Maisie runs toward her.
“There’s my baby girl!”
The hug looks good. It’ll look great on camera, actually—the loving mother reuniting with her daughter, sunlight catching the tears in her eyes. Except I know those aren’t real tears. And I know that Maisie’s arms around her neck are stiff and uncertain, like she’s not quite sure this is allowed.
“Say hi to the camera, Maze!” Sienna angles the phone so they’re both in frame. “We’re having a girls’ day!”
“Put it away.” I’m already moving, stepping between the phone and my daughter. “No cameras.”
“God, you’re so—”
“No. Cameras.” I hold her gaze until she huffs and shoves the phone in her pocket.
Behind me, I feel Maisie’s hand slip into mine. A silent thank you. She squeezes once, and I squeeze back.
“Relax, I’m not posting it. It’s just for me.
” She gives me that look, the one that dares me to argue.
We’ve had this fight before. I’ve threatened lawyers, she’s called me controlling, and somehow she always finds a way to post anyway, with Maisie’s face conveniently angled away or covered with a sticker.
I let it go. Pick my battles. But my jaw aches from clenching.
“Okay!” Sienna pockets the phone and stands, finally looking at me. “Zayden. You look... tired.”
“Long season.”
“Mm.” She doesn’t ask about the season. Doesn’t inquire about anything, really. “So, the park? I thought we could do the park.”
“Yeah, that’s what Maisie wanted.”
“Perfect. Let me just—” She pulls out her phone again, typing something. “Sorry, one sec. Work thing.”
Maisie looks up at me, and I see the hope in her eyes dim just a little. I put my hand on her shoulder and squeeze.
This is going to be a long two hours.
· · ·
Thankfully it’s not that cold today. The park is three blocks away.
Maisie walks between us, holding my hand but not Sienna’s—though Sienna doesn’t seem to notice.
Probably because she chatters the whole walk—about her apartment, her brand deals, some drama with a friend Maisie’s never met.
She’s not ignoring Maisie on purpose. She just doesn’t know how to talk to a six-year-old.
“And then Chloe had the audacity to—” She stops, glancing down. “You okay, baby?”
Maisie nods.
“Good.” Sienna pats her head like she’s a puppy and keeps talking.
Sienna asks about school, about her friends, about what she’s been up to. The questions are right. The tone is right. But her eyes keep drifting to her phone buzzing in her pocket.
“That’s great, baby,” she says when Maisie mentions her art project. “I’d love to see it sometime.”
She won’t. We both know she won’t. But at least she’s saying the words.
We make it to the playground eventually. Maisie runs for the slide—her favorite—while Sienna settles onto a bench and immediately starts editing photos. I stand near the bottom of the slide, close enough to catch Maisie if she needs me.
“Daddy! Watch!”
“I’m watching.”
She climbs to the top, waves at me, and slides down with a shriek of joy that makes something in my chest loosen. This is what matters. This moment right here—my kid being happy, being a kid.
“Sienna.” I don’t turn around. “You should watch her.”
“I am watching.”
“You’re looking at your phone.”
“I can multitask.”
I bite back the response I want to give and focus on Maisie, who’s already climbing back up for another go.
For a few minutes, things are almost okay. Maisie plays, I watch, Sienna does whatever Sienna does. It’s not ideal, but it’s manageable.
Then Maisie falls.
It happens fast—her foot slips on the ladder, and she tumbles sideways, landing hard on the wood chips. I’m moving before she even starts crying, but I hear it—that sharp wail that means she’s actually hurt, not just surprised.
“Hey, hey, I’ve got you.” I scoop her up, checking the damage. Skinned knee, not deep, but bleeding enough to scare her. “You’re okay, it’s just a scrape.”
“It hurts, Daddy.”
“I know. Let me see.” I sit down on the edge of the playground structure, settling her in my lap so I can get a better look. The cut isn’t bad—a little antiseptic and a bandage and she’ll be fine. But she’s crying now, big heaving sobs, and I pull her against my chest and let her get it out.
Sienna appears next to us, phone in hand. “What happened?”
“She fell. Skinned her knee.”
“Oh.” She looks at Maisie—crying, bleeding, clinging to me—and her expression shifts into something I can only describe as inconvenienced. “Baby, you’re okay. It’s just a little cut.”
Maisie cries harder.
“Come here.” Sienna reaches for her, and for a second, I think maybe I’ve misjudged. Maybe she’s going to actually comfort her daughter, actually be a mother for five minutes.
But Maisie doesn’t reach back. She burrows deeper into my chest, and Sienna’s hands drop.
“She’s so dramatic,” she mutters, rolling her eyes. “It’s barely even bleeding.”
I bite my tongue so hard I taste copper.
“I’ve got her,” I manage. “Why don’t you see if you have some tissues in your purse?”
“Fine.” She turns and walks away, already back on her phone before she’s taken three steps.
I hold Maisie until the sobs slow to hiccups. “You’re okay,” I murmur against her hair. “I’ve got you. You’re okay.”
“Mommy didn’t even care.”
The words are so quiet I almost miss them. But I don’t. And they carve something out of my chest that I’m not sure I’ll ever get back.
“She cares,” I lie. “She just doesn’t know how to show it sometimes.”
Maisie doesn’t respond. Just presses her face harder into my shirt and holds on.
· · ·
Sienna leaves an hour early.
“Something came up with work,” she says, not quite meeting my eyes. “A brand thing. I have to take a call.”
On a Sunday. Sure. I guess it’s possible, but not very likely.
“Say bye to Mommy, Maze.”
Maisie is sitting on the couch, bandaged knee visible beneath the hem of her purple dress. She doesn’t get up. Doesn’t run to hug her mom goodbye.
“Bye, Mommy.”
“Bye, baby girl!” Sienna blows a kiss from the doorway. “I’ll see you soon, okay? We’ll do this again!”
She won’t. We both know she won’t. But I don’t say that.
“Thanks for coming,” I say instead, because I was raised with manners even when I don’t want to use them.
“Of course. She’s my daughter too, Zayden.”
I take a deep breath and let it out slowly.
The door closes behind her, and I stand there for a second, fists clenched at my sides, breathing through the anger that’s threatening to swallow me whole.
Then I turn around, and Maisie is just... sitting there. Not crying. Not angry. Just quiet, staring at her hands like they hold the answers to questions she’s too young to be asking.
“Hey, shadow.” I cross to the couch and sit down next to her. “You hungry? We could make mac and cheese. The good kind, with the breadcrumbs.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“Okay. What about a movie? We could watch Encanto again.”
“I don’t want to.”
I don’t push. Just sit there with her, shoulder to shoulder, and let the silence stretch.
After a long moment, she says, “She didn’t even look at my dress.”
My heart cracks clean in half.
“I saw it,” I tell her. “You look beautiful, Maze. The most beautiful girl in the whole park.”
“But she didn’t see.”
“I know.” I put my arm around her, and she leans into me—small and warm and so much stronger than any kid should have to be. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.”
It’s not. It’s so far from okay I don’t even know how to begin fixing it. But I don’t say that either. I just hold my daughter and wish, not for the first time, that I could be enough to fill the hole her mother keeps leaving.
· · ·
Bedtime is quiet.
We go through the routine—bath, pajamas, teeth brushing, two books instead of three because she’s tired in a way that has nothing to do with sleep.
The bath water turned gray from the playground dirt, swirling down the drain like the day washing away.
She didn’t splash like she usually does.
Didn’t make her rubber ducks talk to each other in silly voices.
Just sat there, quiet, while I washed her hair and tried to pretend everything was normal.
Her pajamas are the ones with the unicorns—her favorites—and I made sure to pick them specifically. Small comfort. Better than nothing.
I tuck her in, make sure Ellie the elephant is in position, and click on the nightlight.
Then I lie down next to her, because some nights she needs that. Tonight is definitely one of those nights.
“Daddy?”
“Yeah, shadow?”
“Is she coming back?”
I stare at the glow-in-the-dark stars we stuck on her ceiling last summer, searching for an answer that isn’t a lie but also won’t break her heart.
“I don’t know,” I finally say. “But I’m always here. Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
She’s quiet for a long moment, and I think maybe she’s fallen asleep. Then I feel her hand—small, warm—fist in the fabric of my shirt. Holding on tight, like she’s afraid I might disappear if she lets go.
“I’m not going anywhere, Maze.” I press a kiss to the top of her head. “You’re stuck with me, remember?”
“I remember.”
Her breathing slows, evens out, and eventually, she sleeps. But her hand stays fisted in my shirt, and I don’t move. Don’t even try to untangle myself and go to my own bed.
I just lie there in the dark, my daughter holding onto me like I’m the only solid thing in her world, and I make a promise I have no idea how to keep.
I’m going to fix this.
I don’t know how. I don’t know when. But someday, she’s going to know what it feels like to have someone choose her first. To be loved without conditions, without cameras, without having to perform for an audience.
She deserves that.
She deserves everything.
And I’m going to spend the rest of my life trying to give it to her.