That First Special Kiss

“I will.” She fell silent for a moment, then added, “I’m still really angry with him.”

“Definitely,” He agreed. “Saying it to him will help you put it behind you once and for all.”

“Did you tell your mother how angry you were?”

“It wouldn’t have done any good. She was too drunk to listen.”

“So why haven’t you talked to your father about how you felt about him during those unpleasant years?”

She knew when he stiffened that he didn’t care for that particular question. “I’ve told you before that I’m not mad at my father for anything that happened in my childhood. I don’t blame him for being in the navy, or because the court gave my mother custody instead of my dad when they divorced. He did the best he could.”

Thinking of a twelve-year-old boy so deeply disconsolate that he’d chosen to risk running away and living on urban streets rather than to stay in his troubled mother’s home, she still didn’t quite believe Shane’s denial. He had learned so young to mask his feelings, she mused, and there were still emotions he hid very deeply inside him. Was he hiding them even from himself? Was he ever haunted by memories of that unhappy phase of his life?

“What was it like, living on the streets of Memphis when you were only twelve?” she asked quietly, wondering if he would tell her or shrug the question away with an evasive answer.

She was beginning to think he wasn’t going to answer at all when he shrugged and said, “It was pretty bad. I spent the entire two weeks scared and hungry and cold—praying that my dad would find me, hoping my mother would not.”

“You were so sure Jared would find you?”

“I knew he would try. I left clues for him—things I knew my mother or the police would never understand, but my dad would. Of course, I didn’t know my mother would wait nearly two weeks to call Dad and tell him I was missing. She either didn’t notice for a while or she didn’t want him to know how badly she’d screwed up.”

“Why didn’t you just call him yourself and tell him how unhappy you were?”

“I didn’t know how to call his ship. When I tried to talk to him when he called, I made a mess of trying to tell him and he didn’t really understand. He kept telling me he wished things were different, but that the court had given me to my mother and there was nothing he could do about it. I finally decided it was going to take drastic action on my part to make them change that ruling. No one really understood how unhappy I was until I ran away. After that, Dad wouldn’t have sent me back to my mother even if he’d have had to go on the run himself, to keep me.”

“And you never blamed him for not knowing how bad your home life was?”

“How could he have known? He was on a ship hundreds of miles away. He only had my mother’s word that she was taking proper care of me. He probably thought I was exaggerating things a bit because I missed him and wanted him to come home.”

Kelly bit her lip.

His tone a cross between exasperation and genuine curiosity, Shane asked, “Why do you seem to want me to be angry with my father?”

“That isn’t what I want at all,” she assured him quickly. “I’m just trying to understand you. Everything that went into making you the man you are.”

Settling her bare body more snugly against his, he murmured, “I guess I can understand that, considering the circumstances.”

“Do you still think about your childhood? About those two weeks you spent on the streets of Memphis?”

“I still have dreams about it sometimes,” he answered after a moment. “Nightmares, sort of. I don’t have them as often as I used to, and I think someday they’ll stop altogether, but every once in a while I still wake in a cold sweat, with memories of those weeks in my head.”

“Will you tell me about them?”

“I spent every penny I’d saved from allowance and birthday money on a bus ticket to Memphis, which is where my father had last been stationed. When I got there, I slept curled up in hidden corners. I ate what I could find. I talked a couple of store owners into paying me for sweeping their sidewalks, and I used the money they gave me to buy milk and overripe fruit. I washed up and changed clothes in public rest rooms, washing my spare clothes in the sink and laying them in the sun to dry. I lied to nearly every adult I talked to, but I never stole anything or got into trouble.”

“Did anyone ever try to...hurt you?” she asked, phrasing the question carefully.

“I didn’t get close enough to anyone to give them a chance. I’d been living with a couple of quick-tempered drunks,” he reminded her. “I’d learned to be careful—and fast on my feet.”

“You must have been so happy to see your father.”

“When I spotted him walking the streets looking for me, I was so happy and relieved that I couldn’t even say anything at first. I just stood there with my mouth hanging open and my knees all weak and shaky. And then I started running, and I didn’t stop until I was in my dad’s arms.”

She lifted her head to study his face. “It’s so obvious that you love your father very much.”

“Of course.” He sounded surprised that she would even need to point that out.

Propping her head on one hand, she used her other hand to trace his strong jaw with one finger. “After all you went through, how did you ever turn out so well?”