That was the only word for it. It occupied the entire surface of Ava's desk and approximately 1/3 of her floor and had been organized by geological era with handwritten labels that had clearly involved significant research and a ruler. Victoria sat on the edge of Ava's bed and received the full guided tour which took 34 minutes and she did not look at her phone once because she did not have her phone. She asked questions, real ones. Ava answered them with the complete seriousness of a professor addressing a promising student.
At one point, Victoria asked about a small blue dinosaur figure positioned apart from the others. "That's Dana," Ava said. Victoria went very still. "My mom's name was Dana," Ava said matterofactly, repositioning the figure with careful hands. I named her after my mom because she's the biggest brachiosaurus and brachiosaurus are gentle and they take care of everything around them.
Victoria looked at the blue brachiosaurus for a long moment. That's a beautiful thing to name her, she said. I know, Ava said simply without sadness and without performance. Just a child who had found a way to keep her mother in the room. Dad says she's still here, just different.
Victoria felt something unlock in her chest that she hadn't known was locked. She thought about her own mother, about what it meant to keep someone present when their form had changed. About the photograph downstairs on the wall with the laughing eyes. Your dad is right, she said. Ava looked at her.
Do you have someone like that? Someone who's still here but different. My mother, Victoria said. Ava nodded with great gravity. Then she moved to the next section of the display.
Cretaceous period, she announced. This is where things get complicated. Victoria looked at the array of carefully placed figures and felt something she hadn't expected. Gratitude, full and genuine for a dirt road and a raised hood and a man who stopped because stopping was just what you did. For a child who rebuilt her castle every time someone knocked it down and wrote formal complaints and named her brachiosaurus after the person she missed most.
For the particular mercy of finding yourself in a place where being real was the only currency that meant anything. Marcus made lunch. She helped the way she'd helped before under instruction. Following his lead, getting the cabinet placement right on the first try this time, which he noticed without commenting on, which was itself a comment. They ate at the table with three chairs and talked about nothing important and everything real.
Ava announced that she intended to be a paleontologist and also possibly a judge because she had been thinking about her skill set and both seemed like good fits. Marcus said that was an unusual combination. Ava said the world probably needed more paleontologist judges. Victoria said she could not argue with that logic. Marcus shook his head and ate his soup.
After lunch, after Ava was settled with a book, Marcus and Victoria sat on the porch. First time outside in the actual air. He had his coffee. She had hers. The Saturday afternoon was doing what October afternoons in Georgia do.
Going golden and generous with the light. The kind of light that makes everything look like it's worth keeping. You didn't book the birchwood, he said. It wasn't a question. No, she said.
Where are you staying? I haven't figured that out yet. She said, I drove down this morning and I'll drive back tonight. I have a meeting tomorrow at 9:00. He looked at her.
That's 10 hours of driving in one day, he said. I know because you wanted to come for a Saturday. I wanted to come, she said simply. The Saturday was what was available. He was quiet for a moment.
Then you drove 5 hours to eat biscuits and look at dinosaurs and to see you, she said. Without qualifier, without performance, he looked out at the yard. There's a conversation we should have, he said. I know, she said. About what this is, he said.
About what it can realistically be between somebody who's here and somebody who's 482 mi away, she said. He looked at her. I checked, she said. He almost smiled, then didn't because the conversation they were having was real and deserved to stay real. I have Ava, he said.
Her school is here. Her life is here. Everything she has left of her mother is here. I can't. He stopped.
Started again. I need you to understand what I can and can't move. I'm not asking you to move anything, she said. Then what are you asking? She thought about it honestly.
She thought about everything she'd said in his living room 3 weeks ago about wanting to come back as herself and everything that had happened since then. The board call, the framework she'd written, the way her apartment felt when she was cooking the waffles, the way it felt different now from how it had feltful before. I'm asking for the chance to show you that 482 mi is a number, she said, not a verdict. Marcus looked at her for a long time. I've been hurt, he said quietly.
No drama in it. Just fact. Not recently. Not the way you'd think. I don't mean Dana.
He looked down at his hands. I mean the years after. The way people look at a widowed father with a little girl and decide what the story is before they ask. I've had women who wanted to rescue us. I've had women who wanted the idea of us and not the reality.
He looked up. The reality is early mornings and parent teacher nights and a child who staples things together and has opinions about geological eras. It's not glamorous, Marcus, she said. I'm serious. I know you are, she said.
And I need you to hear this the same way. He waited. I ran a company for 14 years. She said, I made hundreds of decisions that affected thousands of people. I built something from nothing in a field where most people said I'd fail.