She answered immediately.
“Dad?”
“Hey, kiddo.”
“You’re fired?”
“Temporarily unemployed.”
“That sounds like fired.”
I smiled despite myself.
“Your mother has always said you inherited my talent for inappropriate honesty.”
“Are you okay?”
That question almost broke me.
Because children aren’t supposed to ask their parents whether the world is falling apart.
Parents are supposed to stand between them and the collapse.
“I’m fine.”
“Are you lying?”
“Only a little.”
She was quiet.
Then she said, “Mom said maybe we shouldn’t do the Washington trip next month.”
My throat tightened.
I had been saving for that trip for a year.
Sophie wanted to see the Smithsonian.
Her younger sister Lucy wanted to see “the big statue guy,” which I assumed meant Lincoln.
“We’re going.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Yes, I do.”
I said it with confidence I didn’t have.
After hanging up, I stood alone in the hallway staring through the windows at the city.
