Page 269 of The Doctors Will See You Now

He glanced down at his watch, and his smile grew wider. “Only thirty minutes until show time.”

My dad had always been one of those people who arrived everywhere way ahead of schedule, and it was a serious pain in my ass, especially tonight. I understood getting somewhere on time, or even five to ten minutes early, but holy mother of egg rolls, no one needs to get anywhere with an hour’s worth of time to spare.

Mmm…egg rolls…those would be so perfect right now…

I glanced inside my giant purse—which probably wouldn’t fit the dimension requirements for carry-on luggage with Delta—and rummaged through my snack pocket. Fuck yes! A small bag of M&Ms and a snack-size bag of Lay’s potato chips. I knew exactly what I would be doing for the next thirty minutes. It definitely wasn’t egg rolls, but it would do.

My father glared the second my fingers touched the chip bag, the edgy rustle of plastic like a gunshot in the relatively quiet room. It sounded like heaven in the form of snack food to me, but obviously, my father thought otherwise. His gaze tracked down the source of the noise like a goddamn homing device.

“Low,” he chastised.

“What?” I whispered back. “I’m hungry, and it’s not like the show has started. We have at least another thirty minutes before the lights dim and someone starts belting out show tunes.”

“It’s not show tunes, Harlow. It’s Broadway,” he added on a sigh. “And do you remember who helped write this award-winning show?”

“Cyndi Lauper,” I answered. With the way my dad had beat that information into my brain, there was zero possibility of me forgetting it.

“Exactly.”

The words Girls Just Wanna Have Fun and Eat Potato Chips were on the tip of my tongue, but I decided to take it easy on him. The man enjoyed his Broadway shows, and even though I’d always had a tendency to bitch and moan when I got dragged along, I loved my dad. Seeing his smiling face during the shows and hearing his excited chatter afterward was always worth it.

I wasn’t always a hard-ass. Just on occasion. Most of the time I was a real fucking softie at heart, especially when it came to the important people in my life.

“No snacks until intermission.” My dad gave me the look. You know, the one parents give their eight-year-old kids when they meant business.

“You do realize that I’m twenty-nine, right?” I questioned, and he smirked.

“Yeah, but you’ll always be my little girl, Low,” he responded. “And right now, I refuse to sit by and watch you disgrace this theater with greasy potato chips.”

I bet Cyndi Lauper’s dad would let her eat potato chips before the show…

It was in moments like this I’d wished my parents would’ve stayed married longer and at least birthed me a sibling to share the brunt of their meddling. Some days, being the only child was a real pain in my ass. Other days, it was fantastic, but days like this, when all I wanted to do was eat potato chips before Kinky Boots, it was a real drag.

“Excuse me,” a sophisticated older woman whispered toward us. “Do you mind if I slide in?” she asked and held up her tickets. “My son and I have those two seats in the middle.”

“Of course,” my father answered immediately and hopped to his feet to let her pass through the small aisle. I followed his lead, albeit a little less gallantly, as I shoved my potato chips back in my purse and awkwardly stood out of her way with my bag pressed to my abdomen.

“Thank you,” she said with a soft smile and sat down in the empty seat beside my father. “I had hoped to get here earlier, but my son is always running a few minutes behind.”

My father glanced at the empty seat beside her, and she chuckled nervously.

“He’s answering a quick work call outside the doors,” she explained. “I swear, my Scotty doesn’t get a minute’s rest with his job.”

“I feel the same about my little Harlow,” my dad said with a soft smile. “It’s like pulling teeth to get her to go to a Broadway show with her dad.”

Little Harlow? Jesus Christ.

“Considering this is the third Broadway show we’ve seen in the past three weeks, I call baloney, Dad,” I chimed in. He chuckled, but his eyes never left the woman sitting beside him, and oddly enough, her gaze never left him either.

I glanced back and forth between them while they made small talk about the weather and then moved the conversation along to their favorite Broadway shows. Seeing as they didn’t know each other from Adam, I was a bit shocked by how easily their conversation flowed, and the fact that my father was actually showing interest in chatting up a woman.

For the past decade, the man had seemed content to stick to his routine, never once seeking out female companionship, apart from his time with my mother and Jean-Pierre.

“I’m Nicole, by the way,” she said with a shy smile, and my father grinned in response.

“It’s nice to meet you, Nicole. I’m Bill.”

Surprisingly, the next twenty minutes continued that way. The two of them chatted, while I sat back in my seat, daydreamed about my goddamn potato chips, and counted the lines of the ornate ceiling mindlessly.