I was wrong.
I stood outside the Grand Regency Hotel ballroom in the dress I’d bought specifically for this night: deep emerald green, knee-length, elegant but understated. Lily wore the little navy dress she’d picked out herself, the one with tiny white stars on the skirt. She’d spent twenty minutes twirling in front of the mirror that morning, asking if Grandpa would think she looked like a princess.
I told her yes.
I told her he would love it.
I told her a lot of things I no longer believe.
We were ten minutes late because Lily couldn’t find her silver ballet flats — the ones she insisted on wearing because “princesses don’t wear sneakers.” I’d searched under the couch, in the laundry basket, behind the shoe rack. By the time we found them wedged behind the toilet-paper stack in the hall closet, we were already behind schedule.
I didn’t panic.
I told myself it was fine.
