“I don’t have rehearsal.” Alice glanced behind her.

“You took a sabbatical?” I wasn’t sure whether to congratulate her.

“Actually, no.” Her voice had fallen even lower, but she was smiling. “Danny talked me out of it, and I think he’s right. It doesn’t have to be so all or nothing. I’m not Mom, you know? I can find a balance. I called Sherman on the way here, said I needed a few personal days. I had a whole speech prepared, but he didn’t push back. At all.”

She sounded incredulous.

“I’m glad you’re doing it this way,” I said quietly. “You should have it all.”

Alice’s eyes glowed before she rolled them. “Okay, enough about me—go say hi but remember, the important thing is for Dad to be . . .” She drew a horizon with her hands. “Calm, unstressed, you get it.”

“I do,” I said, mouthing thank you to the nurse as she hurried out. Then I turned back to Alice. “Wait—are you thinking I’ll stress him out if I stay here?”

“I mean, it isn’t your fault. He worries about you. If you stayed all night, he’d worry about you not sleeping.”

“He worries about me.”

“You’re his favorite!” She said it like it was obvious. “I know you don’t believe me, but he agonizes. A few weeks ago, you were out late and he wouldn’t stop texting me—what should I do, should I call the cops? I talked him down, you’re welcome. And the years of agita over you studying piano. I just want her to be happy, Al, how can we make sure she’s happy?” She groaned. “Dad is a mess where you’re concerned. He just doesn’t want any of what he’s dealing with to blow back on you. So he dumps it on the rest of us.”

“Because I’m the youngest?”

“It’s more than that,” she murmured. “You’re the only one of us he sees as a human instead of an instrument. He said once that you were the best thing he ever made. To me! His other daughter! That’s how much of a stand-in I am to him, he didn’t even think I would care.”

I should probably have said something about how much Dad whined about her to me, but all I could get out was “Wow.”

She swatted my shoulder. “Don’t let it go to your head.”

Dad shot me a tired smile as I tiptoed over and kissed him on his bearded cheek. He looked smaller, lying there. Mortal.

“Everything’s gonna be okay, sweetheart,” he said, gusto leached from his voice. “This is routine.”

“I know,” I said, remembering what the doctor had told me.

He seemed to consider his next words carefully. Then he looked past me at Alice. “Could you give me and Rooster a minute, Al?”