If they lie to you, like he did, who are you then? Who is he? The person you thought you knew, your favorite person, starts to disappear, a mirage, unless you convince yourself the parts that matter are still true. The love was true. His love is true. Because, if it isn’t, the other option is that it was all a lie, and what are you supposed to do with that? What are you supposed to do with any of this? How do you put the pieces together so he doesn’t disappear completely?

So his daughter doesn’t feel like she is going to disappear completely too?

Bailey wakes up, shortly after midnight.

She rubs her eyes. Then she looks over to find me sitting in the crappy hotel desk chair, watching her.

“Did I fall asleep?” she says.

“You did.”

“What time is it?” she says.

“Late. You should go back to bed.”

She sits up. “It’s kind of hard with you staring at me,” she says.

“Bailey, did you ever visit your father’s childhood home in Boston?” I say. “Did he ever take you to see his house?”

She looks at me confused. “Like where he grew up?”

I nod.

“No. He never took me to Boston. He barely went back there himself.”

“And you never met your grandparents?” I say. “You never spent any time with them?”

“They died before I was born,” she says. “You know that. What’s going on?”

Who is going to fill in this blank for her? This kind of hole? I don’t know where to start.

“Are you hungry?” I say. “You must be hungry. You barely touched your dinner. And I’m famished.”

“Why? You ate both our dinners all on your own.”

“Get dressed, okay?” I say. “Would you get dressed?”

She looks at the fluorescent hotel radio-clock. “It’s midnight,” she says.

I put a sweater on and toss her sweatshirt to her. She looks down at it, splayed across her legs, her Converse sneakers peeking out beneath the hood.

She pulls the sweatshirt over her head, pushing the hood all the way down until her purple hair is sticking out.

“Can I at least get a beer?” she says.

“Absolutely not.”

“I have a fake ID that says otherwise,” she says.

“Please get dressed,” I say.

Magnolia Cafe is an Austin institution, famous for all-night eats, which might explain why it is still busy—music playing, every booth taken—at 12:45 AM.

We get two large coffees and an order of gingerbread pancakes. Bailey seems to love the sweet, spice-filled pancakes dripping in butter and coconut sugar. Bananas on the side. And watching her take them down, if nothing else, makes me feel like I’m doing something good for her.