Chapter 17 - The Things Children BelieveEmma's therapist kept a small wooden dollhouse in her office.
It had four rooms, two staircases, tiny beds, and a dining table with six miniature chairs.
Her name was Dr. Leila Chen.
She specialized in working with young children through play and family-based treatment.
Grant liked her immediately.
She did not rush Emma.
She did not introduce herself as someone who would make the bad feelings disappear.
She simply sat on the rug and asked whether Emma wanted to play.
Emma considered.
Then she chose the dollhouse.
Over the next several visits, Dr. Chen helped Grant understand how frightened children sometimes express experiences through behavior rather than detailed explanations.
Emma moved the tiny mother figure from the kitchen to the bedroom.
She placed the child figure beneath the dining table.
Then she positioned the father figure outside the house.
Grant watched silently.
Dr. Chen did not declare that the arrangement proved anything.
Instead, she asked Emma what was happening in her game.
“The girl is waiting,” Emma said.
“For what?”
“Daddy.”
“Where's Daddy?”
“Work.”
Grant felt a familiar pain.
Dr. Chen gently continued.
“And what does the girl want?”
Emma picked up the small chair.
She hesitated.
Then she placed it beside the child.
“Sit.”
Grant looked away.
Afterward, Dr. Chen met privately with him.
“Emma appears to associate certain mealtime situations with fear. We're also seeing how separation from you affects her.”
Grant nodded.
“Is she going to remember this forever?”
Dr. Chen considered carefully.
“She may remember parts of it. The goal isn't to erase the past. It's to help her build safety, trust, and a different understanding of herself.”
Grant rubbed his hands together.
“I keep thinking about what she saw me do.”
“The slap?”
“Yes.”
“Have you talked with her about it?”
“Not directly. I don't know how.”
Dr. Chen leaned forward.
“Use simple language. Tell her you made a wrong choice. Tell her adults are responsible for their own actions. Don't ask her to reassure you.”
Grant listened.
“And then demonstrate those words through how you behave.”
That night, he found Emma sitting on June's living-room rug.
She was brushing her rabbit with a toy hairbrush.
Grant sat beside her.
“Emma, can Daddy tell you something?”
She nodded.
“When Brooke was angry in the kitchen, Daddy hit her.”
Emma stopped brushing.
He continued gently.
“That was wrong. Adults aren't supposed to hit people because they're angry.”
Emma looked at him.
“Because I throwed food?”
“No, sweetheart. You didn't make Daddy do that.”
She frowned.
“But I was bad.”
Grant moved closer.
“No. You were frightened. And Daddy made his own choice. That choice was my responsibility.”
Emma considered his words with the seriousness only a small child could give them.
“Daddy no hit?”
“No. Daddy is learning better ways to handle anger.”
She resumed brushing the rabbit.
Then she asked, “Brooke come back?”
Grant kept his voice calm.
“You won't have to be alone with Brooke. The grown-ups are working out what happens next.”
Emma leaned against him.
He understood she might ask the same questions again.
Healing would not happen in one perfect conversation.
Two days later, June brought out a box of Claire's photographs.
Emma sat between them on the sofa.
She pointed at a picture of Claire standing on Blackwater Point, her long brown hair whipping across her face.
“Mommy!”
Grant smiled.
“Yes.”
“Mommy windy.”
“She was.”
Emma giggled.
Then her expression changed.
“Brooke didn't like Mommy picture.”
Grant became still.
“Why do you say that?”
Emma pointed toward the photograph.
“She put Mommy away.”
June glanced at him.
Grant remembered that, several months earlier, Brooke had suggested moving most of Claire's framed photographs into storage.
She said the house needed room for new memories.
Grant had agreed.
He had believed he was helping his new wife feel welcome.
Now he wondered what Emma had understood from the disappearance of her mother's face.
He picked up the photograph.
“You know what, sweetheart? We can put Mommy's picture wherever you want.”
Emma's eyes brightened.
“By my bed?”
“Yes.”
“And kitchen?”
Grant swallowed.
“Yes. In the kitchen too.”
June looked at him.
That night, after Emma fell asleep, Grant remained beside her bed.
Claire's photograph stood on the little nightstand.
He remembered the last weeks of her life.
How she had worried about being forgotten.
How she had asked him to tell Emma stories about her.
Grant had promised.
Then grief and guilt had made him avoid those stories because they hurt too much.
Brooke had entered the empty space he left behind.
He had mistaken her willingness to manage the household for love.
Now he understood that Emma needed something different.
Not a perfect replacement for Claire.
Not a beautifully managed home.
A father who listened.
He stepped into the hallway.
June was waiting with two cups of tea.
“She's asleep?”
“Yes.”
June handed him a cup.
“Grant, you don't have to be Claire.”
“I know.”
“You have to be you. But present.”
He nodded.
His phone vibrated.
It was Margaret.
She sounded unusually tense.
“Grant, our investigators found archived correspondence from January 2025.”
“The old development proposal?”
“Yes.”
“What's in it?”
Margaret hesitated.
“An email from Claire.”
Grant stood motionless.
His wife had been dead for nineteen months.
Yet suddenly she was reaching into the present through a message he had never seen.
“What does it say?”
Margaret's answer chilled him.
“She told Owen and Martin that Blackwater Point was not available for their project. And she asked them to stop approaching her about it.”
Grant gripped the phone.
Claire had known they wanted the land.
May you like
She had refused.
And someone had continued planning as though her refusal would eventually cease to matter.
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