Chapter 6 - Saturday Is a Real Day
On the first Friday of their new arrangement, Vincent sent a picture of his train ticket at four in the afternoon. Anna showed Eli the schedule only after confirming the train was running the next morning. He studied the blue circle on the refrigerator and asked whether Vincent would help him feed ducks. Anna explained that the park had a sign asking visitors not to feed the birds. Eli suggested they could tell the ducks stories instead.
Rain made that plan useless. By nine on Saturday, the park was soaked and the wind bent the young trees almost horizontal. Vincent arrived in Madison carrying a folded newspaper and a raincoat, neither of which could compete with the weather. He sent a message from the station, then accepted Anna's suggestion that they meet at the library's children's room instead. She noticed that he didn't treat the change as a personal inconvenience.
Eli marched directly toward him with two picture books under one arm. “The ducks are closed,” he announced.
“I heard,” Vincent said solemnly. “I hope they get the afternoon off.”
The library was not built for business calls. A toddler kept banging a wooden spoon against a plastic pot, and the librarian asked everyone to lower their voices twice. Vincent sat cross-legged on a rug in trousers that looked expensive enough to require a different floor. Eli put a book in his hands, rejected his first attempt at a monster voice, and demonstrated the proper growl. Anna worked on a grant report at a nearby table, close enough to intervene but far enough to let their conversation exist without her.
The morning wasn't uniformly charming. Eli grew tired of the books and wanted the yellow construction toy already held by another child. When Vincent offered him a blue truck instead, Eli swept it aside. For a moment Anna saw Vincent's old impatience rise in his shoulders. He had spent years making adults move aside when he wanted something. A crying child in a public library could not be negotiated with that way.
Vincent looked toward Anna. She gave him a small nod and remained seated. He crouched beside Eli. “You wanted that one,” he said. “It's hard to wait. Would you like to help me build a road until it's free?” Eli refused, cried for several more minutes, and finally accepted a cardboard ramp. Vincent did not rescue the moment with a purchase or a promise. He endured it with awkward patience.
Afterward, Eli asked for crackers. Vincent offered the packet Anna had placed in the side pocket of the child's bag. He'd paid attention when she'd pointed it out. That detail pleased Anna more than it should have. The crisis on the aircraft had taught her how little she could trust a grand assurance. A man finding the correct snack in a crowded bag was no answer to that history, but it was a beginning Eli could understand.
When the visit ended, Vincent didn't ask to extend it. He stood outside under the library awning while Anna fastened Eli into the car. “He doesn't like strangers using a big voice when he's upset,” she said. “You handled it well once you realized.”
“He's not as impressed with me as the people at my office.” Vincent looked faintly embarrassed. “That's probably healthy.”
“It is.” Anna considered him. “Don't make every visit a test you have to ace. He'll have difficult days. So will you.”
Back at home, Eli slept for an hour and woke asking if Vincent had taken the library home with him. Anna explained that the library would still be there next Saturday. He seemed relieved and ran to find his train ticket. She wrote a brief note in the shared calendar: Visit completed. Tired after lunch. Talked about dinosaurs and trucks. It was the sort of record Dr. Wallace recommended so they could notice how Eli was coping without turning every mood into a legal argument.
Across the next two weeks, Vincent kept coming. One visit included a craft table at North Street Studio, where he repaired a wobbly stool because a volunteer had left a screwdriver in reach. Another consisted mostly of walking behind Eli's scooter along a quiet neighborhood path. Vincent wore ordinary clothes and still looked out of place in the children's section of the grocery store where they stopped for bananas. Anna let that discomfort belong to him.
The visits cost Vincent time he had once claimed not to possess. One Wednesday he told Anna a company meeting in New York had been moved to Saturday. He had already arranged to join it remotely after Eli's visit, rather than assuming they should cancel. Anna appreciated the notice, but she kept her response measured. “If work truly makes it impossible sometimes, tell us early. Don't turn yourself into a martyr and then resent us for it.”
Vincent looked at her with surprise. “I used to do that,” he admitted. “Tell you what I'd sacrificed as though the sacrifice bought me your gratitude.”
“Yes. You did.” She hadn't intended the bluntness, but neither of them needed another conversation in which she softened an accurate memory for his sake. They watched Eli push a toy train across the table between them, announcing that it was delivering strawberries to Canada.
Anna's work was expanding in modest, labor-intensive ways. The studio had been offered a chance to run after-school workshops with a neighborhood center, provided it could hire another instructor and manage the transportation schedule. Rina was enthusiastic. Anna wanted the expansion, though it would mean three afternoons when she couldn't easily shift her hours. She was filling in a staffing sheet when Vincent asked whether the new project was worthwhile.
“Very,” she said. “It might also be too much for us this year.”
“I could fund it.” His offer arrived quickly, almost reflexively. Anna looked up. Vincent stopped himself. “Sorry. You didn't ask. I heard a problem and reached for a check.”
“It's not a bad thing to offer help,” she said after a moment. “It's a bad thing to assume the help should put you in charge. We need to decide whether we can deliver what we promise, not just whether we can afford it.”
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That Saturday, Eli became overwhelmed by the noise at a community fair and buried his face in Anna's jacket. She expected Vincent to suggest leaving immediately or to insist the child needed toughening up. Instead, he asked Anna whether she wanted him to fetch the stroller. When he returned, Eli reached one hand toward him without releasing her. Vincent took it gently and walked beside them all the way to the quieter street.
That evening Anna recorded another ordinary note in the calendar. Asked Vincent for his hand at the fair. No distress afterward. She sat staring at the sentence. Trust was beginning to form in a way neither adult could supervise completely. It would hurt Eli if Vincent disappeared now, even if Anna never allowed the word father to be spoken aloud. She forwarded the update to Rebecca and asked what steps would make the arrangement durable beyond six weeks. The question was no longer whether Vincent deserved access to a second chance. It was how the adults could keep a child from paying for their uncertainty.
