Bud

Bud Mularkey is Kate Mularkey’s father and a dependable presence in her family life. His importance emerges through practical care and moments of tenderness: he answers when Kate needs to tell her parents devastating news, and at her wedding he reminds her that she will always be his little girl. The novel places this paternal steadiness beside the instability and loss endured by Tully Hart and, later, Kate’s own family.

Family constancy

On Kate’s first day at KCPO, a call from her parents interrupts a busy morning of unanswered phones and disordered files. Bud and Margie Mularkey have called simply to wish her well and say they are proud of her. Kate is not surprised by their support; she regards her family’s reliability as one of the things in life that does not change, and loves them for it. Bud’s care is part of the ordinary foundation that lets Kate settle into her new work.

His presence also matters in crisis. When Kate must tell her parents that a grave event has occurred, she puts four quarters into a bank of pay phones and calls home. She is relieved that Bud answers rather than Margie, because speaking to her mother at that moment might have overwhelmed her. The detail shows the trust Kate places in her father as a first point of contact when she must deliver painful news.

A father to Kate and a refuge for Tully

Bud’s family care extends beyond his daughter. After Tully begins crying, Kate comforts her with an embrace that Tully initially finds unfamiliar, then cannot bear to leave. Tully’s history has made such physical reassurance feel foreign; Kate’s hug becomes a rare experience of being held and a first sign of the attachment she will find in the Mularkey household. Bud belongs to the family whose steadiness helps make that welcome possible.

The contrast sharpens when Tully tells Kate that her grandmother has died. Tully is angry at Cloud, her grandmother, and God, but what she has waited for is someone who loves her and is truly sorry for her loss. Kate holds her as she breaks into sobs. The moment does not make Bud the person providing the embrace, but it places the family’s dependable affection around Tully at a time when her own maternal ties have failed her.

Wedding and enduring bond

At Kate’s wedding, Bud appears in a rented tuxedo, his hair newly cut. Before the ceremony, Kate sees the music begin beyond the dressing-room doors and feels a wave of love for him. In a brief sequence of remembered care, she recalls his bedtime stories when she was little, the spare money he tucked into her back pocket as she grew older, and his off-key singing at church. The details give weight to the father-daughter bond without making it grand or showy: it has been built through repeated, ordinary acts.

Bud tells Kate that she will always be his little girl and urges her not to forget it. Kate answers that she could never forget. They link arms as the music changes to “Here Comes the Bride” and walk down the aisle together, one halting step after another. The ceremony marks a change in Kate’s life, but Bud’s words insist on continuity: marriage does not erase the relationship that has sustained her since childhood.

Care at the edge of loss

Later, when Kate is gravely ill, Bud is among the family members taking turns to visit her in the hospital. Johnny warns Tully that Kate’s brain cancer has affected her faculties and that she may not recognize her. The warning frames the limits facing everyone who loves Kate, including Bud: presence can offer care, but it cannot restore what the disease is taking.

On Kate’s last night in the hospital, Tully persuades Johnny to take the children home and stays in the room with Kate instead. The scene’s account identifies Bud as having been inside shortly before, underscoring that Kate is surrounded by family and close friends as her condition worsens. Across the novel, Bud’s significance lies in this quiet constancy: he offers Kate a lasting home in the relationship between father and daughter, while the family’s capacity to shelter Tully gives that constancy a wider, chosen-family reach.