important. Did I do something wrong? Is that why he left?”
“Don’t be ridiculous. You were a child. He adored you.”
“How can you say that? He walked away without ever looking back. He never sent so much as a card at Christmas or for my birthday.”
Her comments were greeted with guilty silence. “Mom, he didn’t, did he?” She stared at her mother in stunned horror. “He did send me something and you kept it from me. Why, Mom? Why would you do something like that?”
“You never asked about him,” her mother retorted defensively. “I saw no need to go stirring things up.”
“What did he send?”
With a look of utter defeat on her face, her mother stood up shakily and left the room. Laurie didn’t try to stop her because something told her that at long last her mother wasn’t running away from the past. She was going after it.
With her heart in her throat, Laurie waited. Her mother came back into the room a few minutes later with a huge cardboard box in her arms.
“I should have thrown these away, I suppose,” she murmured as she set the box in front of Laurie. “But I couldn’t. I think I always knew this day would come.”
Laurie stood and peered into the box that had been taped shut and labeled Old Bills, all but ensuring she would never open it. There were postcards and letters and greeting cards, all addressed in a firm, masculine handwriting. There were even a few small gifts, still wrapped in Christmas and birthday paper.
“Oh, sweet heaven,” she murmured as tears filled her eyes and flowed down her cheeks.
“I’ll leave you to go through this,” her mother said.
“No,” Laurie snapped. “Before you go, I want to know why. I want to know why he left.”
“It was simple, really,” her mother said wearily. “He didn’t love me anymore.”
“Falling out of love is never simple. Something must have happened. I heard you arguing that night. It must have been about something.”
“Oh, baby, you have so much to learn about marriage. Even when both people love each other with all their hearts, it takes work and commitment to stay together, to have a relationship that grows stronger year after year. Your dad was tired of the struggle to make ends meet. He was tired of having to account for the money he spent or where he spent his time. He was tired of coming home to the same bed every night.”
“He had an affair?”
“No, not that I knew about, but he was bored with me, with marriage. And when he tired of it all, he left. My love wasn’t enough to keep him here.”
She heard the raw pain in her mother’s voice even after all these times and felt guilty for stirring it up again. “Oh, Mom, I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. I accepted it long ago.”
“Did you really?” Laurie wondered aloud. “You kept all this from me.”
“Maybe I worried that if you knew he wanted to see you, you would choose him over me. I hope that’s not why, but it might have been. I told myself I was doing what was best for you, keeping you with somebody who would always love you, who wouldn’t turn away no matter what.” She regarded Laurie sadly. “Was I so very wrong to do that?”
“I should have had a choice,” Laurie whispered. “It was my choice to make.”
“You were four years old,” her mother retorted sharply.
“If not then, later. When I was eight or ten or even seventeen.”
“By then it was too late.”
Laurie’s heart thudded dully. “He’s dead?”
“No, I just lost track of him. The cards and packages stopped when you were barely ten. I guess he gave up.”
Laurie vowed then and there to find him. If he was still alive, she would find her father again and get his side of the story. Maybe even after all this time, they could try to build some sort of relationship with each other. Maybe he would be someone she would want in her life. Maybe he wouldn’t be, but this time she would have the chance to choose.
And then, at last, maybe she would find the peace that had eluded her for so many years.
Thirteen
When Harlan Patrick walked back into the Jensen kitchen two hours later, he found Laurie still seated at the kitchen table, surrounded by papers. Her face was streaked with tears, her eyes puffy. She was holding an unopened package, its bright red Santa wrapping paper incongruous on the hot summer day.