My daughter and I have an agreement, her stipulation. No matter how late I get in from a playing job, I am to wake her and tell her a story. Today is different, though. My work is done, so I can tell her a story while the sun is shining. A treat for me.

I go up the stairs and make a right, past the lone bathroom in the house, which has a tub but no shower, and open the dark mahogany door of Linney’s room.

Her name is really Linnea, but I soon made it Linney.

She’s asleep, wearing that expression Nancy calls “careless rapture.” She’s in her blue-and-yellow-checked dimity frock. (I didn’t always know these terms, but Nancy makes most of Linney’s clothing and I’ve picked them up from her.)

Linney’s arms are splayed out in total abandon. Her mouth is open and beads of healthy sweat dapple her forehead. She smells like cookies.

I sit at her bedside and allow myself a minute or two to absorb some of the youthful goodness that floats around her, as if she is already so full of loveliness that her body can’t contain it all, and so it hovers over her in the air like the scent above a bed of blue and yellow pansies.

“Hi, Daddowee,” she smacks from a dry mouth, not yet opening her eyes.

“Would you like some water?” I ask.

She nods yes. I put my arm beneath her shoulders and gently lift her up, and then I guide the glass of cool water I find in my right hand up to her lips. I let her control how much she drinks. “Enough?” I ask. She nods and I let her slip back onto her pillow.

“Story,” she asks, probably thinking it’s two A.M.

I nod. “Once upon a time there were two bears named Iggy and Ziggy, and they lived in a hollow forest in the middle of a beautiful tree—”

“No, no, you got it wrong!” she laughs. This is a mandatory part of our ritual. I have to display my ineptitude three times as the prelude to the actual story.

“Sorry. I meant, once upon a time there were five bears named Igworth and Zigworth—”

“No, no, no.” She shakes, weak with laughter.

“Right, I’m sorry. Dumb Dad.”

“Dumb Dad.”

“I of course meant twice upon a time, there were three bears—” This error is a new innovation of mine, it takes her a moment, but then she gets it and howls with delight.

Nancy calls from downstairs. “Linney, some of your friends want to know if you’re coming out to play?”

All business now, she sits up. “Story later, dumb Dad?”

“Of course. Put on your Poll Parrots, not your Sunday shoes.”

She dutifully slips into her scuffed-up brown leather gum soles, pleased with the double knots she ties. “Where’s my clicker?”