That was years ago. These days the only music I heard was the fryer beeping at the diner. I was rinsing coffee mugs when my phone buzzed — Travis.

“You still good to take Noah after school?” I asked, already bracing myself.

He sighed, long and heavy. “Yeah, Mama’s been askin’. I’ll swing by three-thirty, but I got plans at six.”

“Plans meaning what — a woman with a ring light?”

“Plans meaning my life,” he said. “Don’t be late.”

When I hung up, Noah tugged at my sleeve. “Is Daddy nice today?”

“He’s punctual,” I said. “You be nicer than he knows how to be.”

At drop-off, Noah hugged me so tight my apron strings cut into my back. “You’ll come?” he asked.

“I always come.”

By mid-morning the diner smelled like