"You need a suit," Daniel told him one evening in May. "You can't wear the funeral suit to a wedding."
"It's a perfectly good suit."
"It's a perfectly good funeral suit. Weddings need a different energy."
"I don't know what that means."
"It means we're going shopping Saturday."
They went shopping Saturday. Frank tried on four suits, hated all of them, bought the second one. Daniel bought him a tie β blue, to match his eyes, though Daniel didn't say that part out loud. Emma video-called from campus to approve the final look, declared Frank "distinguished," and made him promise to send photos from Oregon.
The wedding was the second Saturday in June. Frank flew out Friday morning β his first flight in twenty years β and Daniel drove him to the airport at five AM, both of them pretending it was no big deal.
"Call me when you land," Daniel said at departures.
"I'll call you when I feel like it," Frank said, but he was gripping his carry-on like a life preserver.
Daniel watched him disappear into the terminal, feeling strangely like a parent sending a kid off to camp.
Frank called Saturday night. Daniel could hear music and laughter in the background.
"Well?" Daniel said.
"Well," Frank said, and Daniel could hear the grin in his voice, "she's lovely. And he cried when he saw me, Daniel. My son cried."
Daniel closed his eyes. "Good."
"I danced. I hadn't danced since Margaret β" Frank stopped. "I danced."
"I'm proud of you, old man."
"Don't get sentimental on me." But Frank's voice was thick. "I'll be home Monday. Don't let the Hendersons' dog dig up my garden."
"I make no promises."
When Frank got home Monday, he brought Daniel a jar of marionberry jam from Oregon and a photograph: Frank in his blue tie, arm around a tall man with Frank's jawline, both of them laughing, a bride beaming beside them.
Daniel put it on his refrigerator. Next to Emma's graduation photo. It fit there, like it had always belonged.
16
In July, Daniel finally drove to Oak Park to see the house he'd inherited.
He'd been putting it off for months. The estate was settled, the money was in his account, Emma's tuition was paid through graduation β but the house sat there, empty, a three-bedroom colonial with his father's life still in it, waiting for Daniel to decide what it meant.
Frank came with him. "Moral support," he'd said, though Daniel suspected he just wanted a road trip.
The house was smaller than Daniel remembered from childhood β or maybe he was bigger. The living room still had the same ugly green carpet. The kitchen still had the magnet collection on the fridge β national parks, all the ones his father had supposedly visited. Daniel stood in the doorway of his old bedroom and felt twelve years old and forty-two at the same time.
They spent the day going through things. Clothes for donation. Books for the library. In the study, Daniel found a box labeled "DANIEL" in his father's handwriting. Inside: report cards, a Little League trophy, a crayon drawing of a house with three stick figures β me and mom and dad, Daniel had written at the top in wobbly letters. Every school photo. Every birthday card Daniel had ever sent, including the ones from the silent years β the ones Daniel had sent out of obligation, not love, and his father had kept anyway.
Frank found him sitting on the study floor, crying quietly, holding the crayon drawing.
"He kept everything," Daniel said.
"Of course he did," Frank said gently. "He was your dad."
Daniel wiped his eyes. "I don't know what to do with this house."
"Yes, you do," Frank said. "You've known since March."
Daniel looked at him. "Have I?"
"You've got six hundred thousand dollars and a paid-off tuition and a daughter who wants to save the world." Frank leaned against the doorframe. "That nonprofit Emma interned at? The one that houses homeless veterans? They need a building, Daniel. I looked it up."
Daniel stared. "You looked it up?"
"I look a lot of things up. I'm retired, not dead." Frank shrugged. "It's just an idea. It's your house."
Daniel looked around the study β at the box labeled DANIEL, at the magnet collection, at the green carpet. He thought about his father, alone in this house, keeping every report card. He thought about be better than me, son.
"Call Emma," Daniel said. "Ask her what she thinks."
Emma cried when he told her. "Dad," she said, "that's the best idea you've ever had."
It took four months β lawyers, paperwork, the nonprofit's board, inspections. But by November, the house in Oak Park had a new sign out front: Mercer House β Transitional Housing for Veterans. The first three residents moved in the week before Thanksgiving.