“Yes, this is Kim Bauer…”
Terri watched her mother pick up the phone. The little girl sighed, wishing that her mother wasn’t so busy all the time. Her family had been in a new city for several days, and the little girl had amused herself with her favorite stuffed bears while she waited for her parents to unpack the rest of her toys.
She heard her mother talking in the background. “Regarding … my father?”
As she played, Terri made little roaring sounds and giggled as the bears play-fought. She looked into the little brown bear’s face and sighed. Her grandfather had bought it for her several days before from the zoo.
“Mommy?” She asked, “When is grandpa coming?”
Looking up, she saw that her mother was still talking to someone. Sighing once more, she returned to playing with her toys. Though she listened to the words her mother was saying, she not understand. Her mother’s tone suddenly became urgent. Slowly, she put down her bears and looked up at her mother, who looked worried.
“Yes, I heard about the peace treaty. No, I… I don’t understand… How could this happen?!”
Terri stood up and walked over to her mother, feeling helpless, not understanding what was wrong.
“Alright…I understand…Thank you…”
Terri watched as her mother hung up the phone and leaned backwards against the counter. She watched helplessly as a tear fell slowly down the tall, slender woman’s pale face.
“What’s wrong, mommy?” The little girl asked.
Kim did not answer. Trying to keep composure in front of her daughter, she took a deep breath, but to no avail. She merely buried her face in her hands helplessly and broke down into desperate sobs.
Not sure of what to do, the little blonde girl threw her arms around her mothers leg in hopes of comforting her. Hearing her mother cry made her want to cry, too.
After a moment, Kim composed herself enough to speak. “I’m sorry, dear. It’s okay. It’s all going to be okay,” she stroked her daughter’s soft hair.
Terri tried to smile. “When Grandpa gets here, he’ll make you feel happy. At the zoo, I fell down and scraped my knee, and it really hurt. I started crying, but Grandpa got me a band-aid and kissed my knee and said-…” She trailed off when she saw that her mother was beginning to cry again. Blinking slowly, she hoped she didn’t say anything wrong.
“No, it’s okay, Terri,” Kim faked a smile. “Keep telling your story. I want to hear all about you and grandpa.”
“Well,” the girl said, “Grandpa…he said…he said that he got hurt a lot before at work. And then he said that knowing that people love him always made his hurts feel better.”
Swallowing, her throat raw, Kim smiled. “That sounds like Grandpa,” she said.
“And then I told Grandpa that I will always love him, so that whenever he gets hurt at work, it wont hurt as bad. Then my knee didn’t hurt anymore!”
“That’s wonderful. I’m so glad you told him that,” Kim picked up her daughter and gave her a big hug, wiping her tears again. “So you wanted to show me what your bears were doing?”
“Yeah!”
The two walked over and sat on the floor together. Kim looked into her daughter’s face while the little girl excitedly explained the bear friends’ adventures. ”This one is named Jack, after grandpa.” Terri said. ”And this one,” she held up the panda bear, “Is named Tony.”
Kim looked taken-aback. “Why did you name him Tony?”
“Grandpa said that he had a friend named Tony, and they went on all sorts of adventures together.” The little girl became excited, “He said that they fought bad guys! And they always won! And he said he’d tell me lots more stories when he comes to live with us.” Noticing that her mother was becoming emotional again, she went back to talking about her bears.
The young woman simply smiled through her tears and listened to her daughter. When her husband got home, she could vent and cry, but now she had to be strong for Terri. Grieving would come later, after she took care of her family. In this simple way, she lived like her father: after all, it’s what he would have wanted.
No comments:
Post a Comment