I try really hard not to cry, because I'm six years old and that means I'm a big girl and I'm not supposed to cry, and I'm Daddy's tough girl, too, so I'm really, really not supposed to cry. But I cry some anyway. And Mama can tell, even though I do my best to hide it. Mama can always tell. So she stops the car in the driveway and turns it off and turns in her seat and looks at me. It's dark but I can still kind of see her face because of the streetlights. She just looks for forever. "Honey, what's the matter?" she asks then, in her I'm-sorry-let-me-fix-it voice.

I rub my eyes like I'm just tired, the way Daddy rubs his eyes a lot, and I say, "Um, Daddy didn't like it."

"Sydney, Daddy loved it."

"No, he didn't," I say, and I mean it. He hated it. The whole thing. He looked really sad and it made me sad and I should never, never have gone tonight. Should never have got him to.

Mama sighs and holds my knee. "C'mon. Let's talk about it inside."

So I unbuckle and get out of the car and follow Mama into the house. I'm in a blue dress. I don't like dresses. Daddy and Uncle Merle both say I look pretty in them but I can't go hunting in a dress, I can't work on a car in a dress, or do anything else really fun. No, that's a lie. I can play piano in a dress, I do play piano in a dress, but only in recitals, I guess, and even though this was my first recital I can tell that they aren't fun like playing at home or at Nana and Papaw's. Well, it's nice when people clap, yeah, I like that. I'm good at piano.

But Daddy didn't like tonight.

Mama says I can shower in the morning and to just get into my pajamas, so I put on some soft pants and one of Daddy's shirts, and Mommy gets in her night dress and robe and she makes hot chocolate, a special treat, and we sit on the couch and we talk.

"Baby, Daddy thought you were wonderful tonight. He was so proud of you. He told you that."

He did. I saw him right after I played and he picked me up and gave me a big hug and told me I was great, but he looked so tired and fidgety, really, when he thought I wasn't looking, and he didn't like it, I know it. I can tell when he doesn't like something, I'm smart, he tells me that nearly every time I see him.

"He hated it." I don't drink more than a quick sip of hot chocolate because I'm about to cry again and it's hard to drink stuff when you're about to cry.

"No, he did not."

"I don't mean – I don't mean, I don't mean me playing. I mean, um, I mean the recital. He didn't like the, um, the . . ."

"The atmosphere?" Mama says, really quiet.

"What?"

"The atmosphere. It means what's going on around someone. The talk, the clothes, the people. Just the general feeling of a place."

"No. He didn't like that." Daddy doesn't belong in a place full of people in nice clothes with sticky stuff in their hair. I mean, Daddy got dressed up tonight, and I thought he looked very handsome, but he didn't look like Daddy, though. Daddy's supposed to wear shirts without sleeves and not shave. That's just Daddy.

Mama plays with my hair. "Sydney, you're very smart."

Yeah, Mama tells me that a lot too. I guess I must be, but I don't feel like it sometimes.

"And you know your daddy. Probably because you're so much like him."

Daddy tells me I'm so much like Mama, though, and it's all just confusing.

"And no, piano recitals . . . things like that, they're not something Daddy would usually want to go to. But doesn't it make you feel special that he does want to go to them just to see you?"

"No, because he hated this one, and he'll hate them all!"

"But he loves you. And you don't know –"

"Yes, I do! Mama –" I'm crying now, big fat tears and all, and I put my hot chocolate on the coffee table and wipe my face because I'm not supposed to cry, I'm not supposed to cry, I'm my daddy's tough girl. "I don't, I don't want Daddy to feel bad, I don't want him to not like the atmosphere . . ."

"Baby . . ."

"He hated it . . ."

"But he thought you were wonderful." My eyes are squeezed shut but Mama's arms come around me and hug tight. She smells good. She smells like Mama and she's soft and I go ahead and let myself cry, because she won't tell Daddy. "He thought you were wonderful," she whispers. "You were wonderful. We're both so, so proud of you, honey . . ."

But I cry and cry, because Mama and Daddy might be proud of me, but Daddy still hated tonight, hated it hated it hated it. And I hate me, I hate me for wanting him to come in the first place.