"I have no idea what I'm doing," he said.

"None of us do," Steph replied. "We're all just walking uphill with stones in our pockets, pretending we know where we're going."

She reached out, squeezed his shoulder once.

"But you're not walking alone."

Papa listened. Tima had grown quiet too, tired from climbing and from the work of serious botanical investigation. She was settling into that drowsy baby state where the world was just colors and soft edges.

"How old would he be?" Papa asked.

"Thirty-seven," Steph said. "Always made terrible jokes. The kind that made you groan, but you'd also repeat them to other people because they stuck with you."

She reached again for the fern, pulling another small piece free with practiced gentleness.

"She doesn't know how strange this all is," Papa said, watching Tima's eyelids growing heavy.

Steph leaned back on her hands, watching the clouds shift above. "Maybe she does," she said. "In her way. Babies feel everything. They're like emotional seismographs. Little tuning forks. She probably knows her life is different than other babies. Knows she doesn't have everyone she should have. But right now, in this moment, she's on a mountain with her father who loves her, and the sun is trying to come out, and there's fern to investigate. And that — that's a pretty good version of life."

Tima let out a long, contented sigh and leaned her head back against his chest, the fern frond still clutched in her small fist like a prize she'd won from the earth itself.

They sat like that for a while. Not needing to say more. Just breath, and breeze, and the hum of something bigger than words passing gently through them. The sound of the wind in the gorse. A distant bird call. Tima's breathing, growing slower, deeper. The two of them — three of them — held in the quiet weight of the mountain.

Steph crouched over the small burner, stirring slowly with the handle of a wooden spoon that had clearly seen better days. The scent of lentils, garlic, and something vaguely herby drifted up in lazy spirals. A metal mug of tea sat beside her knee, steaming gently.

Papa sat nearby, his back against a rock, Tima bundled against his chest in layers of fleece and her sleepy daffodil hat. Her breath was warm through his jacket, one small hand tucked just inside the zip, fingers curled like a comma. She was already halfway to sleep.

"She hated silence," Steph said suddenly, without looking up.

Papa raised an eyebrow.

She clarified. "She couldn't stand when the room went too still. Always had music on. Even if it was just low. Or humming. Or those awful old soundtracks she played when she cooked. Like the world needed a score, you know?"

Papa gave a soft exhale. Not quite a laugh, not quite a sigh.