Lily bounced up and down in her car seat, watching the trees pass through the window. She was finally going to see her daddy. Mommy told her that he could sit up and talk now, and that the big, scary tube wasn't in his mouth anymore.

They were driving to the hospital to have Thanksgiving dinner with her daddy. Last year they went to Grandma and Ti-Ti's for Thanksgiving dinner, but since Daddy was still in the hospital, they were all going to meet at the hospital.

"Now, Lily," her mommy said, looking at her in the mirror, "remember, when we get to the hospital, we have to be very careful to not touch anything. And if someone in a uniform tells us to do something, we have to do it."

"I know, Mommy," Lily said, crossing her arms and scrunching her nose. "You've told me like a million times."

"I know, baby," Mommy said, letting out a tired sigh. "I'm just giving myself a reminder too."

They turned into the parking lot for the big, tall building that Spencer and Guster had brought her to.

"We're here!" Lily exclaimed, unclicking her seatbelt and jumping out of the car. "We're going to see Daddy!"

She grabbed her mommy's hand to pull her quickly across the parking lot, "Mommy! You're walking so slow!"

"I'm sorry, baby. I have a lot to carry."

Her mommy's face looked sad, but she didn't know why. They were finally going to see Daddy! What was there to be sad about?

She pressed the up button for the big elevator. She jumped up as the elevator started moving, just like Spencer had taught her.

"Lily, honey," her mommy said, putting a hand on Lily's shoulder, "You're making Mommy nauseous."

Lily crossed her arms and stopped jumping. The elevator kept moving and she sneakily bounced onto her tiptoes, side eyeing her mommy to see if she noticed. Her mommy just stared at a picture on the wall. Finally, they stopped moving and the doors slid open. Lily was about to run off the elevator, but her mom was already holding her hand. She sighed impatiently and walked with her mommy down the hallway. This place looked different from where she saw her daddy last time. All of the doors were closed, and she couldn't look for her daddy through the windows like she could last time.

They stopped in front of one of the doors and her mommy pushed the door open slowly. They saw her daddy sitting up in bed watching TV.

"Daddy!" Lily yelled, twisting her hand free from her mommy's and running into the room to jump into his lap.

"Oof!" her daddy cried, unable to catch her before she landed hard against his chest.

"Carlton!" Her mommy yelled from behind her, running over and pulling Lily off her daddy.

"Are you okay?" she asked him while he coughed and tried to catch his breath. "Lily, honey, you can't jump on Daddy like that anymore."

Lily stood in the middle of the room where her mommy had put her. She felt alligator tears start to roll down her cheeks. Her daddy couldn't carry her anymore. And now she had hurt him. She promised Mommy that she would listen and be careful and she hurt him. "I'm sorry, Daddy," she cried.

"It's okay, Bunny." Daddy said, holding out his arm to her. She walked over slowly and leaned over towards him, careful not to touch him too much.

"Daddy's not as strong as he used to be," her mommy said, crouching over to look into her eyes. "We just have to be a little more careful with him."

"Can I still sit on Daddy's lap?" Lily asked, wiping away her tears.

"I would love that Lilypad," her daddy said, nodding to Mommy who picked her up and gently set her on her daddy's lap. She twisted so she could hug him with both arms, trying to be careful but so excited she couldn't contain herself.

"I missed you so much, Daddy!" She ran her fingertips along the edge of the big squishy helmet he wore with a thin red line hiding under it, across his dropsy cheek, and down his arm that lay floppy on a pillow next to him. She readjusted her head onto the pillow and closed her eyes, lulled to sleep by the sound of her mommy and daddy whispering and the smell of her daddy. He smelled like coffee kisses in the morning before preschool.

"Hi, Binky!" Lily woke up to her grandmas entering the room loudly, arms full of dishes and bags.

"Grandma!" Lily cried, jumping out of her daddy's lap and running over for hugs. "Ti-Ti!"

"Hello, my little flower girl," Ti-Ti said, scooping Lily into her arms. Her grandma and Ti-Ti had gotten married when she was a baby and she got to be the flower girl. She was too little to remember it, but she loved looking at the pictures of her in her pretty green flower girl dress being rolled down the aisle in a pretty wagon, throwing flower petals on the grass.

Lily leaned over to get hugs from her other Grandma who gave her a kiss on the forehead before putting her back on the ground to go fuss over her daddy.

"Are you ready to have the yummiest Thanksgiving dinner ever to be had in a hospital?" Ti-Ti said, crouching down to match Lily's height. Lily nodded her head quickly.

"Did you make orange pie?" She leaned in to whisper into her Ti-Ti's ear.

"Of course, I made the orange pie!" Ti-Ti said, but then leaned in to whisper back, "it might be haunted though- I used Halloween pumpkins to make it and I think I heard a ghost escape when I cut it in half."

Lily's mouth dropped open and she made her eyes super wide. "It is?"

Her Ti-Ti's eyes looked like they were sparkling, and she nodded.

"Should we get dinner set up?" her mommy asked, pulling dishes out of the big bags and lining the hospital counter with them.

"Yeah," Lily said, feeling her belly grumbling. "Mommy, I'm hungry!"

"Let's get you a plate," Ti-Ti said, piling some mashed potatoes and yucky-blucky peas onto her plate. Her daddy sat in his chair quietly. He didn't say anything and didn't really look at them either. His eyes watched their feet move around the room getting food.

Lily thought he looked sad. Maybe he was sad because he couldn't eat any of Ti-Ti's Halloween pie. Mommy said that he couldn't eat yet because of his accident, which made Lily feel sad for her daddy- she loved eating!

Lily was sitting on the edge of Daddy's bed when someone with a long pretty ponytail walked in holding a big bottle of yellowish milky stuff. She poured the stuff into a bag and attached the bag to a tube that was sticking out of her daddy's nose.

"What's that?" Lily asked the girl, pointing to the bottle.

"This is your daddy's dinner," the girl said, bringing the bottle over for Lily to see. "He can't eat yet, so he gets this so he's not hungry."

"That smells disgusting!" Lily exclaimed, pinching her nose with her fingers and shoveling some mashed potatoes into her mouth quickly to get the sour smell out of her nose. "Daddy, does it taste bad?"

Her daddy didn't say anything, just looked at his hands with more sad eyes.

"He can't taste it, baby," Grandma answered for him.

"That's good, Daddy," Lily said, "cause it smells really bad!"

The girl with the pretty ponytail left and everyone began talking again.

Except Daddy.

He just kept looking down at his hands in a wrap. He had a thick, puffy hat on where the big white band aid used to be and tubes snaked out of his arms with bags of liquid dripping into them. He had more gray hair than he had before he left. And he couldn't even sit up straight in the bed. He was sort of flopped over to the side like when she fell asleep in her car seat. And he didn't look at her in the eyes anymore either. He would only look at the floor or behind her.

Her daddy looked so different now. Not that it mattered to her. Lily missed her daddy so much that her heart hurt. She missed playing with her daddy when she got home from school and night-night kisses from her Mommy and Daddy before bed.

Lily didn't mind that her daddy looked different or acted different or couldn't pick her up anymore. She did mind a little that he didn't look at her. But she just missed her daddy and wanted him to come home. Everything would be better when he came home.