I didn’t know what to do. I stood up, and she opened her arms, and I sat in her lap, like I was the one who was crying.

Rocco came over and whined. He rested his chin on Sheila’s knee, and we laughed. “Dumb dog,” she said. And she gave him a pizza crust.

Please Don’t Take

There’s one part of Grandpa’s tapes that was my secret for a long time. It’s Dad’s voice, when he was little, singing a song.

You are my sunshine, my only sunshine.

You make me happy when skies are gray.

You’ll never know, dear, how much I love you.

Please don’t take my sunshine away.

Grandpa isn’t there. Dad must have pushed “record” again after Grandpa finished reading to him. It’s a real song—I checked on the computer. He skipped some lines, but he ended up in the right place: Please don’t take my sunshine away.

Sometimes I think about the little kid singing that song, and how he is still sort of inside Dad, all these years later.

—

I doubt Dad remembers. He never listens to the tapes anymore. His song is in the middle of A Bear Called Paddington, between chapters six and seven. That’s the tape I wouldn’t let Sonia listen to when she was here. I didn’t want to share it, even with her.

I think Jesse is Dad’s sunshine now. I’m not saying that he loves Jesse more than he loves me, or Uncle Frank, or more than he loved Mom, even. It’s because Jesse is the one who might have been taken away. Jesse is who Dad wasn’t sure he was allowed to have in the first place. And Jesse wasn’t sure he could have Dad.

I didn’t plan to tell Sheila any of this. It just happened, after she fed Rocco her last pizza crust.

She squeezed my hands, hard. “Bea. Do you know what this means? We have our wedding theme. Finally.”

“We do?”

She nodded. “Sunshine.”

—

Sheila started making a to-do list right away. “Where can we buy daisies? I want to make daisy chains. And we’ll have sunflowers, sun tea…all nice and simple. Your dad won’t mind. Oh! We can decorate the seating cards, too, a little sun on each one!” She hugged me. “Bea, I really want this wedding to be perfect. You know?”

I nodded. I did know.

By the time Mom came to pick me up, we had two pages of ideas.

“Get your stuff, hon,” Mom said. “I’m starving.”

“You didn’t eat?” Sheila jumped up. “I want to make you something!”

“Oh no,” Mom said. “I can wait.”