He smiled. “Forget Microsoft. Tonight starts the ball rolling on Restorase.” Restorase was the trade name of a new drug Will had helped develop, and the subject of his presentation tonight. “In thirty days, Abby will be set for Harvard, and you can start wearing haute couture.”

“I’m thinking Brown,” Karen said with a grudging laugh.

It was an old joke between them, started in the days when they had so little money that a trip to Wendy’s Hamburgers was a treat. Now they could actually afford those schools, but the joke took them back to what in some ways had been a happier time.

“I’ll see you both Sunday,” Will said. He climbed into the Baron, started the twin engines, and checked the wind conditions with ATIS on the radio. After contacting ground control, he waved through the Plexiglas, and began his taxi toward the runway.

Outside, Karen backed toward the Expedition with Abby in her arms. “Come on, honey. It’s hot. We can watch him take off from inside the truck.”

“But I want him to see me!”

Karen sighed. “All right.”

Inside the Baron, Will acknowledged final clearance from the tower, then released his brakes and roared up the sunny runway. The Baron lifted into the sky like a tethered hawk granted freedom. Instead of simply banking to his left to head south, he executed a teardrop turn, which brought him right over the black Expedition on the ground. He could see Karen and Abby standing beside it. As he passed over at six hundred feet, he waggled his wings like a fighter pilot signaling to friendly ground troops.

On the concrete below, Abby whooped with glee. “He did it, Mom! He did it!”

“I’m sorry we couldn’t go this time, honey,” Karen said, squeezing her shoulders.

“That’s okay.” Abby reached up and took her mother’s hands. “You know what?”

“What?”

“I like arranging flowers, too.”