Chapter 14 - Claire’s Last Secret
I didn’t ask Claire what the letter said.
Not immediately.
Margaret was right about one thing.
Some truths belonged first to the person who carried them.
Claire walked outside.
I followed several minutes later.
She stood beside the storage facility fence staring toward the highway.
“What did Margaret know?”
Claire wiped her face.
“That I lied to you too.”
My stomach sank.
“About what?”
“When you proposed to me, I didn’t reject you only because of my mother.”
I waited.
Claire’s mother had been ill.
That part was true.
But there had been another reason.
Claire was already pregnant.
She had suspected it days before I proposed.
“What?”
“I was terrified.”
“Why?”
“My mother had raised me alone. She told me marrying because of a pregnancy would ruin both our lives.”
“But I loved you.”
“I know.”
“Then why not tell me?”
“Because I wanted you to choose your future without feeling trapped.”
I laughed bitterly.
“Everybody was always deciding what was best for me.”
“I know.”
Tears rolled down her cheeks.
Claire refused my proposal thinking she would tell me once she was certain.
Then I moved away.
By the time she confirmed the pregnancy, she regretted everything.
That was why she came looking for me.
Margaret intercepted her.
One terrible decision collided with another.
“And Margaret knew?”
“I told her that day.”
That explained everything.
Margaret hadn’t merely known Claire was pregnant.
She knew Claire had originally rejected me while carrying my child.
She saw vulnerability.
And she exploited it.
Claire handed me Margaret’s letter.
The final paragraph read:
Claire, I spent my life blaming you because David loved you before he loved me. The truth is, I was never really competing with you. I was competing with my own fear that no one would ever choose me if they knew who I was. David did choose me. For thirty-six years. And I repaid that love by stealing choices from everyone around me.
I sat beside Claire.
For several minutes, neither of us spoke.
Then she said:
“Do you hate her?”
I thought about it.
“No.”
That surprised me.
“I hate what she did.”
Claire nodded.
“So do I.”
“But I loved her.”
“I know.”
Those truths could exist together.
That evening, Daniel invited both Claire and me to dinner.
Emma insisted I sit beside her.
Sophie asked whether she could call me Grandpa David.
I said yes before she finished the sentence.
After dinner, Daniel and I stood outside.
“I don’t know how to do this,” he admitted.
“Do what?”
“Have a father.”
I smiled.
“I don’t know how to have a forty-year-old son.”
He laughed.
“Good.”
“Why good?”
“Then we’re both beginners.”
Before I left, he handed me an invitation.
Emma’s school had a Grandparents Day event the following Friday.
“Would you come?”
My eyes burned.
“I’ll be there.”
Then Daniel added:
“There’s one more thing.”
“What?”
He glanced toward Claire through the window.
“Mom still loves you.”
May you like
I stared at him.
“And I think Margaret knew she did.”
