PART TWO…

THE CHILD

It was a whirl-wind romance fraught with complications. No one knows for sure because no one talked even though asked…but The Child could surmise the complication was a drunken night on the town with him shipping out the next day to fight the end of a war, and her rebounding from a heartbroken, and after many months of trying to forget, a still heartbroken heart. The Child.

Remember, I remind My Reader, this is only a story, albeit a complicated one. As stated early on…no one knows for sure because no one ever talked not even thirty-eight years later when it only became more complicated and then difficult.

Father side: There was the letter and then the explanation to his wife of forty years.  Then their children, now adults, had to be told. Arrangements made for a meet-up. Party plates. Barbecue. Cake. The Child, now The Daughter, delivered herself for the first time to The Father on her thirty-ninth birthday. It was a birthday party. Lots and lots of cake, half-siblings, nephews, aunts, friends and neighbours.

Daughter side: Not one celebration. The finding of The Father kept from the mother, the step-sisters and half-brother until later.  The story, I again remind My Reader is just a story… a thirty-eight years old well-kept storied secret. According to the mother no one, least of all The Daughter, needed to know…the story. Missing pieces were meant to be kept missing the mother said.   It didn’t matter. Actually, The Daughter said, it did matter. To me it mattered then and now. The story digresses…enough missing pieces had been found. Finally.

Seated next to each other, the Real Father and The Daughter, began to talk. Cups of coffee drank and cigarettes smoked in a back garden on a picnic table. No story details. Snippets. I saw you once, The Father said. I was on a job and your mother happened to be there. You were about seven and your mother brought you out so I could see you. It was the first time I saw you. You were beautiful. The Daughter said no one ever told me I was beautiful then. You were beautiful then as you are now The Father said.  She cried as The Child and as The Daughter.

Complications remain but not without the surround-sound of images of the few years they shared before The Father died. The mirror reflects all the missing pieces searched for and found. The Father’s soul is the reflection The Daughter now sees.

Yes, life is complicated and sometimes difficult. But, My Reader asks, when isn’t it?

And so it goes…