Liam Vance arrived at Sunshine Valley Park at 9:58 AM.
Two minutes early. Exactly as planned.
He sat in his black Aston Martin for those two minutes, hands gripping the steering wheel, staring at the playground equipment through the windshield like it was enemy territory. Which, in a way, it was.
Mothers with strollers. Toddlers shrieking on swings. The smell of fresh-cut grass and sunscreen. Everything about this place was foreign. Hostile. Designed for a life Liam had never lived and didn't understand.
At exactly 10:00 AM, he exited the vehicle.
David, his head of security, moved to follow.
"Stay with the car," Liam ordered.
"Sir, the contract doesn't prohibit—"
"I said stay."
David hesitated, then nodded. Liam didn't need witnesses to his humiliation.
He straightened his suit jacket—Armani, slate grey, completely inappropriate for a park—and reached into the backseat for the gift. The packaging alone had cost $200. Inside: the XR-7000 Advanced Robotics Construction Kit, rated for ages 12 and up, with over 400 pieces and Bluetooth connectivity.
His assistant had suggested it. "Cutting edge technology, sir. Educational. Impressive."
Liam had approved without question.
Now, walking across the dewy grass toward the designated meeting area, the box felt absurdly large in his hands. Cumbersome. Wrong.
Like everything else about this situation.
Elara was already there.
She sat on a park bench beneath an oak tree, Leo beside her with a juice box and a picture book. She'd dressed him in jeans and a blue T-shirt with a cartoon dinosaur. Normal. Comfortable. The kind of childhood Liam would never understand.
The kind he'd been denied.
Elara saw him approaching. Her spine straightened. Her expression cooled to absolute zero.
Leo looked up from his book.
For a moment—just a moment—Liam forgot how to breathe.
His son.
In person. Close enough to touch. With those grey eyes that were a mirror of Liam's own, and that mess of dark hair, and the small nose that must have come from Elara. He was small. So impossibly small. How did people keep humans this size alive?
"You're on time," Elara said. Not a compliment. An observation.
"The contract stipulates—"
"I know what the contract says." She stood, placing herself between Liam and Leo. Always shielding. Always protecting. "Two hours. I'll be present the entire time. You don't touch him without his permission. Clear?"
"Clear."
Her eyes dropped to the massive box in his hands. Something flickered across her face—satisfaction? Amusement? She was enjoying this.
"Leo," she said softly, turning to their son. "This is Liam. He's here to spend some time with you today."
Leo studied him with unsettling intensity. Kids weren't supposed to look at you like that—like they could see through the expensive suit and the controlled expression to the mess underneath.
"Hi," Leo said.
Liam's throat was suddenly very dry. "Hello."
Silence.
Elara waited.
Liam realized he was supposed to do something. Say something. Act like a human being instead of a corporate robot.
He thrust the box forward. "I brought you a gift."
Leo's eyes widened. He looked at his mother for permission. She nodded, though her expression remained cold.
Leo approached cautiously. Took the box. It was almost as big as he was.
"Wow," he said, because children were taught to say 'wow' when adults gave them things. "Thank you."
"You're welcome."
More silence.
Leo tried to open the box. The packaging was sealed with industrial-strength tape and plastic security wrapping. His small fingers couldn't find purchase.
Liam watched him struggle for fifteen seconds before realizing he should help.
He knelt—suit pants on grass, absurd—and produced a pocket knife. Elara tensed immediately.
"Relax," Liam said. "I'm opening a box, not staging a coup."
He sliced through the tape with efficient precision and pulled back the cardboard. Inside: foam packaging, instruction manual (84 pages), and hundreds of small metal and plastic components in sealed bags.
Leo stared at it.
"It's a robotics kit," Liam explained. "You build machines. Program them. It connects to an app on a tablet—I can have one delivered if you don't have—"
"I'm five," Leo said.
The words hung in the air.
Liam blinked. "Yes. I'm aware."
"This is for big kids." Leo pointed to the label. "Ages twelve and up."
Elara made a small sound. Not quite a laugh. Definitely satisfaction.
Liam looked at the box, then at his son, then at the box again. The XR-7000 suddenly seemed less impressive and more ridiculous. A monument to his complete ignorance about what five-year-olds actually wanted.
"I—" He stopped. Regrouped. "It's advanced. But you're intelligent. I thought you might—"
"It's okay," Leo said quickly, with the kind of politeness that was worse than honesty. "Thank you for the present."
He carefully closed the box and set it aside.
Then he looked at the playground equipment. "Can I go on the swings?"
"Yes," Elara said.
Leo ran off, sneakers kicking up grass, T-shirt flapping, completely unburdened by the awkward disaster behind him.
Leaving Liam alone with Elara and the $800 robotics kit that his son would never touch.
"Well," Elara said, settling back onto the bench. "That went well."
Liam remained kneeling on the grass, staring after Leo. "He's too young for it."
"Yes."
"I should have researched—"
"Yes."
He stood, brushing off his pants. Bits of grass clung stubbornly. "What do five-year-olds like?"
Elara's smile was cold. "Their fathers to actually know them."
The hit landed.
Liam sat on the bench, leaving appropriate distance between them. Not because the contract required it, but because her hostility was a physical force field.
Leo was on the swings now, pumping his legs, going higher. Laughing. Free.
"You have one hour and forty-seven minutes remaining," Elara said, checking her watch. "I suggest you use them."
Liam watched his son. Tried to think of something to say. Something to do. How did normal fathers do this? What was the protocol?
He had negotiated billion-dollar deals. Stared down boardrooms full of sharks. Built an empire from nothing.
And he couldn't figure out how to talk to a five-year-old.
"Does he like chess?" Liam asked.
"You've seen the photo."
"Does he like other things?"
Elara's expression softened slightly. Not warmth, but less ice. "He likes drawing. Building with blocks. Stories about dinosaurs. Normal things."
"I don't know what normal is."
She looked at him then. Really looked at him. "I know."
They sat in silence. Leo moved from swings to slide. A group of other kids arrived, and Leo waved at them—friends, clearly. They accepted him immediately into their game of tag.
Liam watched, transfixed. The ease of it. The naturalness. The way Leo existed in the world without armor.
"He's good at making friends," Liam said.
"Yes."
"He gets that from you."
Elara didn't respond.
Thirty minutes passed. Then forty. Leo played. Liam watched. Elara sat like a sentinel, making sure he didn't violate any terms.
This was torture. This was purgatory. This was what he deserved.
At the one-hour mark, Leo ran back, breathless and flushed. "I'm thirsty."
Elara produced a water bottle from her bag. Leo drank, then looked at Liam with that unnerving directness.
"Do you know how to play tag?"
Liam's mind went blank. "I—no."
"It's easy. Someone's 'it' and they chase people and tag them. Then that person is 'it.'"
"I understand the concept."
"Do you want to play?"
Yes. No. He didn't know. He was in a $3,000 suit.
"I don't think—"
"It's okay," Leo said, with that same terrible politeness. He turned back to his friends.
And Liam realized: he was failing. Spectacularly. Publicly. In front of the only two people whose opinions mattered.
Another forty minutes of silence. Leo played. Liam sat. Elara maintained her watch.
The contract mandated two hours. It felt like twelve.
As the time neared its end, Leo returned to gather his things. The robotics kit sat forgotten by the bench.
"Do you want to take this home?" Liam asked, gesturing to the box.
Leo looked at it. Then at Liam. "Maybe when I'm twelve."
Honest. Brutal. Childlike.
Liam nodded. "That's fair."
Leo picked up his dinosaur book. Started to walk toward his mother. Then stopped. Turned back.
"Liam?"
It was the first time his son had said his name.
"Yes?"
"Did you not have toys when you were little?"
The question was innocent. Curious. Not meant to wound.
It eviscerated him anyway.
Liam's throat closed. His carefully constructed walls—decades of building, of protecting, of never showing weakness—cracked.
"No," he said, and his voice came out rough. Raw. "I didn't."
Leo tilted his head, processing this. "That's sad."
"Yes. It was."
"Is that why you bought me such a big toy? Because you didn't have any?"
Liam couldn't speak. Couldn't nod. Couldn't do anything but stare at this small, impossibly perceptive child who'd just seen straight through him.
"It's okay," Leo said. "Maybe next time you can bring something smaller. Like a dinosaur. I like dinosaurs."
"Okay," Liam managed.
Leo smiled—a real smile, not polite, just genuine—and ran back to Elara.
Leaving Liam on the bench, surrounded by the wreckage of his first attempt at fatherhood.
He sat there for a moment after they left, staring at the abandoned robotics kit.
$800. Eighty-four-page instruction manual. Bluetooth connectivity.
Completely, utterly useless.
He pulled out his phone. Typed into the search bar: dinosaur toys for five year olds.
Elara drove home in silence, Leo humming in the backseat.
She'd watched the entire disaster unfold. Watched Liam arrive like he was attending a board meeting. Watched him present that ridiculous gift. Watched him sit in painful, awkward silence while their son played.
She'd expected to feel satisfaction. Vindication. He was failing, just as she'd predicted.
Instead, she felt something else.
Something dangerous.
When Leo had asked about toys, when Liam's face had done that thing—that flicker of raw, unguarded pain—Elara had seen it.
The boy he'd been. The child who'd had nothing.
The man who'd built walls so high he'd forgotten how to be human.
She gripped the steering wheel tighter.
She would not feel sorry for him. Would not soften. Would not let that moment of vulnerability crack her resolve.
He'd destroyed her once. She wouldn't give him the chance to do it again.
But Leo's voice drifted from the backseat: "Mommy? I think Liam is sad."
Elara's hands tightened. "Why do you think that?"
"Because he doesn't know how to play. And everyone should know how to play."
Her son. Her brilliant, empathetic, impossibly kind son.
"Maybe," she said carefully, "he just needs to learn."
"Can we teach him?"
Elara looked in the rearview mirror. Met Leo's hopeful grey eyes.
Eyes exactly like his father's.
"Maybe," she said.
And hated herself a little for meaning it.