He had Frank’s eyebrows.

Then he pushed his glasses up his nose with one finger, exactly the way Frank always had.

My chest tightened.

“Yes,” I said.

“What was he like when he was young?”

Claire started to interrupt.

“Eli, maybe later.”

“No,” I said.

I pulled out the chair next to me.

“Come here.”

He sat down.

So I told him.

Not about death.

Not about lies.

Not about the complicated weight of a forty-year marriage.

I told him Frank could never make pancakes without burning the first batch.

Eli laughed.

“He did that here.”

I told him Frank deliberately sang the wrong words to familiar songs.

“He did that too.”

“I know.”

“And he checked all the doors twice before bed,” Eli said.

“Every single night.”

For the first time since Frank died, I laughed without immediately feeling guilty afterward.

Claire sat across from us and cried quietly.