And Nathan, despite the headache and the guilt and the knowledge that he’d be leaving soon, found himself not wanting to go. On the third evening, Alicia was making dinner while Nathan sat at the kitchen table, supposedly resting, but actually helping her peel potatoes. Marcus was outside dealing with something in the barn, and Alicia had been chattering about her college orientation materials when she suddenly went quiet.
“Can I ask you something?” she said, not looking up from the onion she was chopping. “Sure.” “Do you have family? Like people waiting for you to get home?” Nathan’s hands stilled. The question was innocent, just a teenager making conversation, but it hit him harder than he expected.
“No,” he said after a moment, “not really.” “No wife or girlfriend?” “No.” “What about parents? Siblings?” Nathan set down the potato peeler carefully. “My parents divorced when I was ten. Dad remarried, moved to California, started a new family. We don’t really talk. Mom died two years ago, cancer, and I’m an only child.”
Alicia finally looked up, her eyes soft with sympathy. “I’m sorry. That must be lonely.” “It is,” Nathan admitted, surprising himself with his honesty. “Very lonely.” They worked in silence for a minute, and then Alicia said quietly, “My mom died three years ago, same thing, cancer. It was awful watching her get sicker and knowing we couldn’t afford the treatments that might have helped. That’s why I want to design medical equipment, so maybe other families won’t have to choose between bankruptcy and fighting for someone’s life.”
Nathan felt something crack in his chest. “That’s a good reason, a really good reason.” “Dad doesn’t talk about her much. I think it hurts too much, but I see him sometimes, late at night, just standing in the kitchen looking at her photo, and I wish I could make it better somehow.” “You do make it better,” Nathan said, “just by being here, by being his daughter. That matters more than you probably realize.”
Alicia smiled at him, and it was so genuine and warm that Nathan had to look away, had to focus on the potato in his hands because the alternative was acknowledging how much he wished someone would smile at him like that, like he was family, like he belonged.
That night, lying in the guest room that had probably been Alicia’s mother’s sewing room or office before she got sick, Nathan stared at the ceiling and admitted something to himself that he’d been avoiding for three days. He didn’t want to leave this house, not because of gratitude or obligation, or even guilt about the cornfield, though those were all real enough. He didn’t want to leave because for the first time in longer than he could remember, he felt like he was somewhere that mattered, with people who saw him as a person rather than a bank account or a business opportunity.