The children gradually became more comfortable.
Lorraine asked them simple questions.
She wanted to know which one liked Christmas best.
Mason answered first.
Wyatt disagreed with him.
Delilah smiled.
Savannah watched their grandmother with growing interest.
It was an ordinary conversation.
That was what made it so emotional.
These were the kinds of moments Lorraine had never experienced with them.
She had missed their first eight Christmases.
She had missed eight birthdays.
She had missed the years when they were learning to speak, walk, and discover the world around them.
I watched her listen.
She didn't rush them.
She didn't demand affection.
She simply tried to learn who they were.
I appreciated that.
The children deserved to be treated as people, not as proof of something that had happened between their parents.
Across the room, Terrence was still unusually quiet.
His fiancée stood beside him.
Every so often, she looked toward the children.
Then she looked at the engagement ring box.
I could tell the morning had become something neither of them had planned.
Terrence finally approached me.
"Can we talk?"
I looked at the children.
Then I nodded.
We moved a short distance away.
Not far enough to leave them alone.
I wasn't going to disappear from their sight in an unfamiliar house.
Terrence stopped near the Christmas tree.
For a moment, he seemed unable to find a place to begin.
I waited.
He looked at the children again.
"They're beautiful."
I nodded.
"They are."
He swallowed.
"All four of them."
"Yes."
He looked at me.
"I never knew."
I held his gaze.
"I know."
There was something uncomfortable about hearing him say it.
Not because I doubted that he had been unaware.
Because the truth was that I had known every single day.
I had known when they were small.
I had known when they began asking questions.
I had known when they started looking more like him.
I had known when each birthday passed.
He had known none of it.
And now he was standing in front of me, trying to understand eight years in a few minutes.
"I didn't think…" he began.
Then he stopped.
I waited.
He looked down at his hands.
"I didn't think this would happen."
I looked at him.
"Neither did I."
He raised his eyes.
"Keahu, I was wrong about a lot of things."
I didn't answer.
It was the first time I had heard him admit even a small part of what happened.
But I wasn't ready to turn that sentence into an apology.
There was too much history between us.
Too many years.
Too many things that couldn't be repaired by a few words beside a Christmas tree.
He looked toward Mason and Wyatt.
"Do they know I'm their father?"
"They know who you are."
He nodded slowly.
"Have they asked about me?"
"Sometimes."
He looked at the floor again.
I continued.
"I answered their questions honestly, as much as I could."
He seemed to want to ask more.
But his fiancée approached before he could.
"Terrence."
He turned.
She looked at him, then at me.
"We really need to talk."
He nodded.
I stepped away.
I had no interest in standing between them.
Whatever they had planned for their future was their responsibility.
The engagement ring box was still on the table.
I noticed it again.
It looked small beside the Christmas decorations.
A little box that had probably represented a happy future for two people.
Now it sat untouched.
I returned to the children.
Mason was telling Lorraine something.
Wyatt was listening.
Delilah had moved closer to Savannah.
Lorraine looked up when she saw me.
"They're wonderful children."
I smiled.
"Thank you."
She looked at me for a moment.
"You must be very proud."
"I am."
She nodded.
Then she reached for my hand.
"I wish I had known them sooner."
I looked at her.
There were many things I could have said.
I could have reminded her that the years were gone.
I could have told her how difficult it had been.
I could have asked why nobody had ever tried to find me.
But I didn't.
I simply said, "I understand."
I wasn't giving away the past.
I was choosing not to spend the entire day fighting it.
The children continued talking.
Their laughter began to replace some of the silence that had filled the room when we first arrived.
I watched them and thought about the woman I had been eight years earlier.
She had believed that Terrence leaving meant she had lost the life she wanted.
She had cried over a future that would never happen.
She had worried that her children would grow up feeling unwanted.
But those children were now sitting in front of their grandmother.
They were happy.
They were healthy.
They were loved.
And I had done what I promised myself I would do.
I had given them a home where they never had to question whether they mattered.
Terrence had finally discovered the family he had left behind.
But I had spent eight years building one.
And as I stood there watching my children talk with Lorraine, I understood something I hadn't fully appreciated before.
His absence had shaped our beginning.
It had not decided our ending.
Click here to continue reading: PART 9: Terrence Finally Tried to Explain His Disappearance, but the Children Made Him Understand How Much Time He Had Lost
Eight Years After He Abandoned Me, My Ex-Husband Sent an Invitation That Revealed Exactly What He Still Thought of Me
Part 8 of 20
