“Landon caught it,” she says.

I shake my head. “Caught . . . ?”

“The stomach bug,” she says. “He can’t come tonight.”

“Okay.” I nod as my brain spins through its own version of the Read-a-thon Google Doc. Landon was going to be in the other community room, the one for refreshments. He was also supposed to go pick up a lot of those refreshments.

And be our “tech guy.” Set up the projector and screen, run the videos and live streams.

“That’s not all,” Ashleigh says.

My eyes snap back to her face. The corners of her mouth pull wide in an exaggerated grimace. “Three other volunteers have called in sick too.”

“Shit.”

I should have prepared for this.

In a way, I did. I didn’t put a cap on volunteers. The more, the better. But our version of more didn’t account for losing four people, three and a half hours before start time.

I’m trying to come up with a plan, buying myself time with an evenly spaced out “Okay . . . okay,” as if some brilliant solution is in the process of being birthed.

Back under the walkway, someone calls my name.

“I’m going to take care of it,” Ashleigh tells me.

“How?” I say.

“Don’t worry about it,” she tells me.

At my snort, she says, “Fine! Worry about it. But also trust me. I’ll figure it out. You go focus on the other nine million things you need to do.”

Another volunteer walks out the front doors, scans the lawn, and heads straight for me with a look of abject panic on his face.

“Go.” Ashleigh shoves me. “You put out your fires. I’ve got this one. Tonight will be amazing.”

“I need it to be,” I say.

She sets her hands on my shoulders and looks me in the eye. “Daphne. Remember who this is for.”

“That’s why I want to get it right.”

“I get that,” she says. “But if I’ve learned anything from parenting, it’s that it matters way more that you’re present than that you’re perfect. Just be here, really be here, and the kids will love it.”

My shoulders loosen. “I can do that.”

“Of course you can,” she says. “You’re Daphne Fucking Vincent.”

“Aww.” I touch my chest. “You know my last name and my middle name.”

Twenty minutes until go time, from the comfort of a paper-lined toilet seat, I check my phone.

Dad has called three times in an hour.

My stomach plummets.

I don’t want to call him back, especially right now, but I’m more anxious about what might happen if I don’t.

I flush the toilet, wash my hands, leave the bathroom, and step outside to make the call.

The early-evening sky has a summery glow, the heat dense except when the breeze billows off the water. I sweep my hair off my neck into a bun and hit the call button.

“Heeeey, kid,” Dad says.

I bypass my own hello. “Is everything okay?”

“What do you mean?” he says.

“Is there some kind of emergency?” Then, to his nonresponse, I say, “You called me three times. Were they pocket dials?”

“No, no, no,” he says. “I just wanted to wish you luck. Or break a leg, or whatever is apropos for this situation.”

“What situation?” I ask.

“Your big . . . thing tonight,” he says. “The library thing!”

I can’t think of a single thing to say.

“Sorry we had to hightail it out of there, by the way,” he says.

“It’s fine,” I say. “I didn’t expect anything else.”

Dad laughs. “That’s what I tried to tell him. I said, I know my kid, and she doesn’t get hung up on that kind of thing. He seems to think you’re some kind of high-strung neurotic type. I mean, he must, or he wouldn’t have—”

“Wait, wait,” I say. “What are you talking about?”

“Your boyfriend,” he says.

“Peter?”

“The new guy,” he says. “Miles.”

I massage my brow. “Dad, I already told you, Miles is just a friend.”

“Well, that’s what I thought,” he says brightly, like I’ve just proved a point for him, or maybe won him a bet. “But the way he was talking—”

“Dad. I still don’t know what you’re talking about.”