fearless love for her children. I knew if you mentioned it to her, especially when you were little, it could be the thing that triggered her. She fought hard for years to beat her depression,” he says. “I never wanted you to have to experience what depression turned her into.”
I nod, running a hand under my eyes. “I understand that,” I say. Seeming agitated, he stands, fiddling with his shirt before turning to face me again. “But why was she digging in the backyard? What triggered all this?”
“I did,” he huffs as his eyes fill with tears. “I was young and stupid. I had just lost my daughter, my wife was in the hospital, and instead of being a man about it, I turned to alcohol. I didn’t know how to get rid of the pain. I was twenty-one years old and it felt like my world was imploding on itself. We were still in college at the time. I went to a bar and got drunk one night and slept with a girl from one of my classes.” Torment plays in his eyes again as he looks above me at the front door. “I barely even remembered doing it. I took the semester off shortly after that. About six months later, Della was out of the hospital and I was on my way to work when I ran into the girl. She was very pregnant, told me she was having a girl that she would name after her grandmother, Daisy May. My heart broke. I knew I had to tell your mother what I did, but she was only just getting better. Even if we survived me cheating, I knew her finding out I had gotten another girl pregnant months after we lost our baby would kill her. Then on top of that, the girl would also be named Daisy. I just couldn’t tell her.”
Tears roll down my fingers as my hands cover my mouth. He looks deflated as he speaks and the pain he is in is clear. “I didn’t know what to do, Xia,” He says. “So I hid the child from her. I did all I could to help her move on from the loss. She was hospitalized during the funeral under heavy sedation, so later we took a few of Daisy’s baby things and buried them in the backyard as a memorial. It was then that she started to heal. As the years went on I could never find a good time to tell her about my other daughter. That is, until you and Jordan saw us in the café that day.”
Tightness grips my chest and I go still. “That was her?” I stand, facing him as he looks down at me. “I thought you were cheating.”
“No, that was your sister. I’ve never so much as looked at another woman since that night. It was the worst mistake of my life. After she had the baby, the girl moved back to her hometown in Georgia, but I did all I could to keep in contact with Daisy Mae as she grew. I was in Tulsa when she called me. She said that she was at CHU getting ready to enroll for her senior year. I panicked and left the meeting, asking her to meet me at the café. I didn’t think that you would be there of all places.”
My world spins as I go back to that day in the café. How gentle he was with her, how he looked at her like she was one of the most special things in the world. It wasn’t lust in his eyes. It was love. He loves her, just like he loves me. And his love for me and my mother caused him to have to choose between two very difficult decisions.
“I hated keeping you two apart, Xia, but I swear I did it for Della. Maybe that sounds stupid, like it’s a convenient excuse for me committing the ultimate crime against my marriage at the worst possible time. My actions are inexcusable, but it’s my truth. It’s the route I thought was best at the time.”
“Wow,” I say. It’s really the only word I can formulate at the moment.
“I know,” he says. “But I was forthcoming with everything else, and it took her a long time to forgive me.”
We continue to talk a little longer as he explains what happened the night he told her the truth. How he wanted to make the announcement about my