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She looks so happy!

His heart contracted, like a vise had taken hold of it in his chest, squeezing out every little bit of hope he’d been trying to force himself to have.

Your sister must love that you’re so good with her

His eyes found the time on the phone screen, and he cursed under his breath, shoved the phone back into his pocket, and broke into a jog.

It wasn’t Cass’s fault. Quite the opposite, actually.

Ash had had plenty of opportunities to tell Cass what had happened, why he’d had Bri with him on that drive from Los Angeles to Seattle, why he’d been so broken when they’d met in Redding. For some reason, though, he hadn’t been able to bring himself to explain that he was his niece’s legal guardian or that he was his niece’s legal guardian because his sister had passed away unexpectedly just before Thanksgiving. Cass had no idea.

So Ash shouldn’t have been surprised at Cass’s response to the selfie he’d sent. He’d taken that picture with Bri in a rare moment where he’d almost felt okay-ish—Joanna and Henry and Shaina had been there with him for the holiday, and they’d finished opening presents and eating, and Bri had been adorable and smiley and such a joy. And he’d made the mistake of wanting to share that moment with a man who had quickly been becoming Ash’s friend.

Whatever friendship they’d had growing, however, he’d surely ruined. He’d completely ghosted Cass, unable to bring himself to reply, even after Cass had texted him one more time to ask whether Ash was okay.

And the circle of grief continued.

With practiced detachment, Ash forced a sharp breath and then jogged up the steps to Miller Hall and pulled open the door at only two minutes before eight o’clock. He had to focus, and that meant not dwelling on things. For Bri.

Bri was napping and perfectly content when Ash arrived back at the daycare center. Lorraine chatted with him for several minutes, letting him know how Bri’s day had been. Then she handed him a sheet of paper—a little mini report that she said he could expect to receive each day at pickup time. It was essentially a log of Bri’s feedings, diaper changes, naps, and anything else important that had happened during the day.

Then Lorraine carefully picked Bri up—miraculously without waking her—and helped Ash tuck her safely into her car seat, which Ash secured into the stroller for their short walk home to his apartment.

The cold morning had given way to an equally cold and cloudy early afternoon, and Ash pulled an extra blanket out of Bri’s diaper bag and laid it over the sleeping baby before thanking Mandy—the woman at the front desk who had helped him that morning—and then exiting the building. Bri stayed asleep the whole walk and didn’t wake up until Ash lifted her out of the stroller inside his apartment. She cooed quietly and smiled up at him and reached for his face, and when he brought her closer to kiss her forehead, she put her hands on his cheeks and squealed with delight.

“You’re such a happy girl today,” he said, spinning her around.

She giggled and squeed again, and when he stopped and shifted her to cradle her in one arm so he could start unloading her used bottles from the diaper bag, she began babbling an adorable string of nonsense sounds, punctuating each of her “sentences” with a messy, wet raspberry. Both the babbling and the raspberries had really only started a couple of days ago, and both, according to Shaina and Joanna, were on schedule or even a little early in terms of her developmental milestones. And even though he’d never say it out loud, he was half relieved her go-to babble words seemed to be “ba” and “da” rather than “ma.”

“Is that so?” he asked after a particularly long string of ba-ba-ba-bas. He paused at the kitchen sink, setting the diaper bag up on the counter, and gave Bri another kiss on her forehead.

“Ba-ba-baaaaaa!”

Ash grinned, even as tears stung his eyes. “Ba-ba-ba-ba?” he echoed back, and she squealed in delight and blew another raspberry.

They played like that for a few minutes, and then Ash moved back into the living room and positioned Bri on her tummy on her play mat so he had his hands free to wash her bottles. He’d just gotten started when his phone rang. He dried his hands and turned around, resting up against the counter as he pulled his phone out of his pocket. Shaina’s name lit up the display.

For half a second, he considered not answering. Not that he didn’t want to talk to her, he actually did. He needed to tell her about Bri’s day and that he had survived it, too, and he needed to hear her voice to remind him that he wasn’t really alone in this. But at the same time, he was tired. He was tired of talking and checking in and describing his entire day all the time, and he was tired of answering all of her questions. Mostly, he was tired of having to skirt around his answer to the question he knew she would ask first: How are you doing?

“Okay, considering” was getting to be a hard sell, especially when the truth was so very far from that.

He couldn’t not answer, though, and so he pushed himself away from the counter and made his way over to sit on the couch, close to where Bri was now lying on her back, stuffing one corner of a colorful squishy block toy into her mouth.

“Hey, Shai,” he answered, flopping down on his back on the couch and turning his head to watch Bri.

“Hey, I’m on my way to class, but I have a few minutes and, just, well, how did it go? How is she? I assume you’re back home?” Shaina fired off the questions all in one breath, and Ash closed his eyes.

“Yeah, we’re home. It went well.” He blinked and shifted onto his side.

Bri cooed and let out an adorable squeal but then flopped both hands down on the play mat, inadvertently flinging her toy too far away for her to grab it again. She kicked her feet and looked like she might start crying. Instead, though, she blew a raspberry, brought one hand to her mouth, and began sucking on her fingers.

Ash shook his head. “I won’t give you a play-by-play, but I was more of a mess this morning than she was. The caregivers there are amazing, and Bri was happy. She ate and slept and played. I think it’s going to work out just fine.”

“Oh, yay, I’m glad. I mean, I thought that would be the case, but I was a little worried, too, you know?”

“She’s so cute right now, here, one sec.” Ash propped himself up on one elbow and snapped a quick picture of Bri, then sent it to Shaina. “Did it come through? She’s playing, and she rolled over from her tummy to her back again. And—”

“Oh my god, yes, it came through. Ohhhhh . . .” There was something in Shaina’s voice that tugged at Ash’s heart, and he knew exactly what it was. “Oh, Ash, she looks happy. God, I miss her already.”