Isabelle heads directly to the stove, where she’s left ready a bowl of six cracked eggs beaten with a little bit of milk. It has always been her job to cook the eggs. She cuts a pad of butter from the stick, just exactly as thick as the tip of her finger, the precise amount that will coat every inch of the pan without leaving too much of a melted pool at the bottom. As soon as the butter has melted, she gives the eggs a final whisking and then pours them slowly in, stirring them carefully with a large wooden spoon.

Wilson watches his daughter at the stove. He has set the table and brought the sausage over, along with a pitcher of orange juice. Isabelle’s hair is ratty in the back from messy sleeping, and she scrambles the eggs before her with a constant, even motion. The biscuits are probably ready to come out, he thinks, but for him to get them Isabelle would have to step away from in front of the stove, and this would break her rhythm. Another minute won’t burn them, he thinks; he’ll let Isabelle finish her eggs.

“Good morning.” He hears Ruth behind him and turns around.

“Hi,” he says.

“Thanks for the coffee,” she says, kissing his cheek. “Did something burn?”

“The bacon,” Wilson says. The microwave beeps again. “But I’ve done another batch.” He opens the microwave and takes the bacon out. It is perfectly done. “This must be a new kind of bacon,” he says. “It cooks fast.”

“No,” Ruth says. “It’s the same bacon we always get.”

“I don’t think so,” Wilson says. “Three and a half minutes, and it’s done.”

Ruth sighs and shrugs. “I don’t know what to tell you. It’s the same bacon.”

Wilson puts the bacon on a plate just as Isabelle is scraping the eggs into a serving dish. She covers it with a towel so the eggs stay warm and brings it to the table. Wilson quickly goes to the oven to take the biscuits out; they are slightly overdone and the bottoms stick to the cookie sheet.

“They’re the same biscuits, too,” Ruth says. “Everything’s cooking quickly today,” she says. “Maybe it’s the snow.”

Wilson shrugs and puts the biscuits into a basket, and the three of them sit down at the table in the family room. It has always amused Wilson to watch Isabelle eat this breakfast. She carefully constructs each bite, making little sandwiches of egg and bacon between two tiny layers of biscuit. These she salts individually and dips in maple syrup. She is deliberate, methodical, her face a study in concentration.

He clears his throat. “Good eggs, Belle,” he says.

“They are good,” Ruth says. “It’s all good. Thank you, guys.”

“It snowed a lot, huh,” Wilson says. “What would you say, eight, ten inches?”

“Oh no,” Ruth says. “I’d say a foot, at least.”