A Daughter's Trust

“You were there, Ricky? I—I talked to everyone…at the church. How could I have missed you?”

Rick studied the neat rows patterned into his newly vacuumed carpet.

“I was at the cemetery. For the burial.” He’d driven to the wrong community church. He’d assumed his sister would be buried in the neighborhood where he’d grown up. Where his mother still lived. Instead, it was at a church across from the funeral home.

“I was there, too….”

“Not to watch your daughter lowered into the ground, you weren’t.” His words were biting. Filled with things she had no way of knowing about. Things that, in part, had nothing to do with her.

“No…we left. They said we had to. They lower the casket after the family leaves.” Her voice broke and Rick tried not to feel a thing. He should be a master at it by now, at least where she was concerned.

“Nice to know I had a sister, Nancy.” Nancy. What kid called his mother by her first name?

He’d been about eight when he’d first asked the question.

You’re my friend, aren’t you, Ricky? His mother’s eyes had been slits in her face as she’d tried to focus on him.

Yeah. She’d seemed to need a friend. Though he wondered what being a friend to an adult actually entailed.

You see then, all my friends call me Nancy. She’d smiled. And he’d smiled back. And that was what Rick remembered most about that little interlude.

He’d lost a mother that day. But, hey, he’d gained a friend, right?

“I wanted to tell you, Ricky. I wanted Christy to know you. I really did, but…”

The proverbial “but.” His archenemy.

“But what?” He asked now, telling himself to be kind. Somehow. For himself, if not for her. He wasn’t a mean man. And didn’t want to become one.

“I was afraid….”

“Afraid I’d take her from you?”

Her silence was his answer. Both then and now. She wasn’t going to tell him he had a niece, either. Some things didn’t change.

“I know about Carrie, Nancy.” He wasn’t going to spare her, but managed to soften his tone, at least. “I need to know what your plans are.”

“Oh, Ricky, I was going to tell you. As soon as it’s all official.”

As soon as he couldn’t do anything to stop her?

“I’m going to get her, Ricky. My baby’s little girl—” Her voice broke again.

Rick waited. The woman was grieving over her daughter, for chrissake. No one should have to bear that kind of senseless pain.

“I’ve worked so hard. Ever since we found out a baby was coming.” Nancy listed the steps she’d taken. A list he could have recited for her. “Christy’s going to be watching me. And I’m going to make her proud, Ricky. And maybe you, too?”

“It’s not right, Nancy. You had your chance. Two of them.” He was being harsh. But a baby’s life was at stake.

“It’ll be different this time, Ricky. I promise you.”

I promise, my little man, we’ll stay together this time. I’m going to make it this time. I’m going to make you proud of me….

Rick grabbed his keys. Cell phone in hand, he headed out to the Nitro. He needed air. Sunshine.

“We’ll be a family, Ricky. You, me and Christy’s baby. A real family. Just like we always said we wanted.”

It was the one thing he and this woman had in common, other than a shared gene pool—their desire to be part of a family.