Page 18 of When You Wish Upon a Wideout

It was when she wondered, after seeing Grace change into her pajamas, if she had hurt herself on the playground at school. A fall must have caused the deep purple bruising along her back. Sienna thought she had gone hard of hearing a few days later when the doctor drawled out, “leukemia.”

A hundred lives felt like an understatement.

“Dad would’ve been proud of him. We all know Beau was the son he never had,” he joked. “Not much bragging rights about chess tournaments. State championships? Division-I scholarships? NFL? Beau was the favorite.”

Sienna slid the carton across the table to Henry. “You and me are quite the pair. He didn’t go around bragging about his daughter getting knocked up at nineteen.”

There was a time when Sienna knew her father wasn’t proud of her. Like when she flunked out of college, drank too much, and ended up pregnant after a night spent with a near stranger who had wished the baby away.

She and her father spent most of her pregnancy tiptoeing around each other in this very kitchen. But occasionally, Sienna would find a stack of white chocolate bars in the pantry or a fresh jar of spicy pickles. And on the day Grace was born, the mask of disappointment fell from her father’s face, and a smile never left it.

It was a smile Sienna hadn’t seen since before her mother’s death.

Grace had given Sienna purpose. But she also healed a family that had been broken by grief. She filled the fourth seat at their table that had been empty after her mother died and Beau had left. Glancing at the empty chair, she could imagine her father sitting there, hunched over a plate, bringing his mouth to the fork instead of the fork to his mouth. Grace had learned how to eat from him apparently. Watching Henry, who had dug into the pint, eating the same way, Sienna smiled.

Her father and Henry were co-fathers, coaching soccer games, teaching Grace how to ride a bike, cursing as they put together presents on Christmas Eve. Her father watched Grace while Sienna worked as a bartender.Why does she need a dad when she already has a family?Sienna would often think to herself.

But Sienna learned at a young age that nothing was guaranteed. Parents weren’t always around, and sometimes they missed the points where you needed them the most. Best friends didn’t always mean best friends forever, and love didn’t always mean an infinite love.

But the most painful, unfair lesson Sienna had ever learned was that children don’t always outlive their parents. And she spent many years of her life holding her breath, afraid she and Grace might be an example of that lesson too.

Sienna was grateful her father was spared from watching Grace decline so rapidly. If he had been alive at the time of Grace’s diagnosis, if he watched her scream through blood draws, vomit from chemotherapy, nearly die of infection twice, lose every strand of her beautiful, angelic hair, if he had seen the victorious look on her face disappear when her cancer returned, surely Sienna’s father would have died of a broken heart.

“I’m beat,” Henry stood from the table. “Hey, she needs her labs done before the appointment next week, right? Want me to take her after school?”

“No, I’ll do it.”You’ve done so much already. It took a special kind of man to do what Henry had done—to help raise his niece and support his sister through their cancer journey.

“Henry,” Sienna called to her brother. “He would’ve been proud of you too. Trust me on that.”

Later that night, as Sienna crawled into bed and listened to her brother shut his door, she felt grateful for his offer, for his attentiveness. But a deep pit swirled in her stomach as she thought about the bloodwork and the upcoming appointment, and tears pooled behind her closed eyes. She might not have been alone in the day-to-day grind with Grace, but there had been no one holding her at night when she let all her fears seep into her pillow tear by tear.

* * *

“I’m wondering if they’ll invite you back to all the home games next year,” Dr. Barron said, sitting behind her desk. “The Sparks have been god-awful before you showed up.”

Grace grinned. “I got to keep the coin.”

Dr. Barron slid the glasses from the top of her hair to her nose. “I see you came with souvenirs.”

She motioned to the large shopping bag filled to the brim with Sparks mementos that Sienna and Grace agreed patients might appreciate more than the floor of Grace’s room would. Grace pulled out a signed ball and tossed it to Dr. Barron, who laughed as she caught it before palming it in her hands and placing it on the bookshelf behind her.

“I’m your favorite patient now, right?”

“Well,” Dr. Barron began. “You really aren’t my active patient anymore. The good news is your results are still excellent, like we had hoped.” She beamed at Grace, and Sienna let out the breath she had been holding. “The bad news is you’re super anemic, and I’d like to see a little more weight on you at this point.”

Grace did a happy dance in her chair.

“Hooray for anemia,” Sienna chimed in sarcastically, trying to remain upright even though the relief that hit her body nearly made her slide out of the chair.

Dr. Barron pulled out a prescription pad. “We’ll up the iron supplements. And, Mom, here’s a prescription for some calorically dense food,” she joked. “Other than that, we’ll see you insixmonths.”

Sienna swung her head. “Not three?”

Dr. Barron turned to her computer. “No need.”

Grace shot up from the chair, taking the handles of the shopping bag. “Can I go now, Mom? I want to see Molly.”

“I’ll meet you up there.” Sienna waited until Grace was well out of the office before turning to Dr. Barron. “You really don’t need to see her until the summer?”

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