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“Yes, Tommy, I do,” I told him, no trace of doubt in my voice. Tommy wouldn’t know the real reason we were moving until I thought the time was right – if that day would every come.
The truth is I received an email from Sarah’s biological father. He wants to take her away.
It had taken me all of five minutes after opening that email to make the decision to move. The three of us had already lost so much that there was no way in hell I would let us be broken apart even further.
We’d been on the road for two long days. It was just over thirteen hours from San Diego to Telluride, Colorado. Alone, the trip would have taken me exactly that long. But with two hell-raisers piled in the backseat, everything took twice as long. Bathroom breaks and food runs took up many stops, and occasionally, I had to pull over to break a fight.
I glanced in the backseat again, my eyes falling on Sarah’s sleeping face. She looked so much like her mother, Telissa, with her dark hair and striking green eyes. They could have been twins.
For years, I searched for a sign of myself in Sarah’s face, but I never found any. Finally, when I learned the truth about her, it made sense. Everything I thought I knew was no longer true. I expected my feelings for Sarah to change, but they never did. It hurt like hell to know the truth about the affair, but as far as I was concerned, Sarah was 100 percent my little girl. No one could take that away from me.
As I watched her sleeping beside her brother, I knew I’d made the right decision to move. Sarah and her brother were the only ones that kept me pushing forward. Without them, I would never have risen out of my deep depression. It was an ugly place for me and they deserved so much more. I still had demons inside that wanted to pull me back into that hell hole, but I had two good reasons to tell those demons to go fuck off.
At five years old, Sarah was the bane of her brother’s existence. Tommy was seven and smack in the middle of a “girls-have-cooties” phase. If Sarah so much as sneezed wrong, her brother flew into a full-blown rage that took hours to subside. Sarah, of course, loved to rile him up. It was her mission during the entire ride to make him as angry as possible and then watch while he got in trouble for being mean. I knew it wasn’t fair, but I expected more from Tommy. He was older.
When we finally pulled off the highway and began the trek into Telluride, the kids fell asleep together. I glanced behind me in the rearview mirror and saw them each with their heads flopped back against their seats. I smiled to myself and kept driving. There were times during the trip when I’d asked myself why we didn’t just catch a flight. I could have easily paid for first class tickets to Colorado, but the idea of a car trip brought back blissful memories of my childhood. I guess I wanted them to have the same experience. Selfishly, it also allowed me to slow down time. In that moment, they were so young and innocent that I wanted to freeze them forever.
In so many ways, they were still babies, safe from harm and the world’s harsh realities. Still, I knew better. At seven and five, my kids had been through more grief than people three times their ages. My wife, their mother, passed away just over a year before our move to Telluride.
She developed cancer after Sarah’s first birthday, and three years later, she lost the fight. It was hard on the kids, but their innocence helped them grieve quickly and start to move on. For me, it was different.
Thirty minutes later, we pulled into the driveway of our new home, where the moving truck was waiting for us. I climbed out of the car, shaking hands with the moving guys and unlocking the front door. While we unloaded, I let the kids continue sleeping. It was nice to have a bit of peace and quiet, but I also wanted them out of the way while the movers were unloading the furniture and boxes. The last thing I needed was one of them getting hurt.
“Anything else, Mr. Evans?” one of the moving guys asked after they carried the last box inside.
“No.” I shook my head.
“All right,” he said with a nod. “Good luck with everything.”
“Thanks.” I’d already paid the moving company a large sum of money, and I didn’t see a reason to tip the men for doing their jobs.
Just as I was about to unload the luggage from the trunk, Sarah woke up and stepped out of the car. She let the door slam closed behind her. Tommy woke at the sound and rubbed his eyes. He looked around for a few seconds before he too climbed out of the car.
“We’re here already?” Tommy asked.
“Yup.” I said. “What do you think?”
Tommy and Sarah both looked at the house. I followed their gazes and took in the beauty of the house before us. In such a small town, we could get a house three times the size of our home back in San Diego.
“It sucks,” Sarah said boldly.
“Sarah.” I shot her a warning look, but she just shrugged.
“Well, you asked,” she said.
“It’s fine,” Tommy said. “It’s fine, Dad.”
“Can we go inside now?” Sarah asked.
“Sure.” I nodded, and the kids hurried through the front door.
Taking a deep breath to calm my nerves, I grabbed our luggage out of the trunk and heaved it up the front steps. Once inside, I set the bags in the foyer and went to find my kids. They’d already disappeared, which wasn’t a surprise.
“Sarah!” I called. “Tommy!”
“We’re upstairs!” Tommy yelled back.
With a sigh, I mounted the stairs and went to find them. They were in the master bedroom, looking out the window at the street below.
