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“I’m sure,” Alexis said. Her grandparents still owned the restaurant her mother had mentioned, and she’d spent many hours there herself waiting tables.
“But I decided that we were meant to be together. So, I agreed to marry him, and I drove my car with everything I owned to Boulder, Colorado and we were married the day I arrived. I thought it was so romantic to leave everyone and everything I’d ever loved and marry this man.”
“But it wasn’t?” Alexis asked.
“Oh, it was. And he was a good man, who doted on me. I got pregnant after a few months, and I started to miss my mother. I wanted her with me as all these changes were happening to my body. She couldn’t take time away from the restaurant though, and I got depressed in Colorado, home all day with no one but the housekeeper to talk to, and I didn’t much like the housekeeper. I’d call Mom all hours of the day and night, simply for someone to talk to.”
“Sounds like you were miserable.”
“I was, but it wasn’t about Alex. I loved him, as much as a young girl who knows nothing about love can.” Mom shook her head. “But as I was getting closer to having you, I decided to come back here to have you, so my mother could be with me.
“Alex didn’t want me to go, but I insisted, and in the end, he agreed. So, I moved back in with my parents, who had never liked Alex to begin with. We’d talk on the phone for a bit every day, but things were different. Living with him no longer sounded romantic, and I felt better having my friends and family around me. Finally, while we were talking one night, I told him I didn’t think I could go back. I was so much happier here. I suggested he sell his ranch and move here, where he could start a new ranch. He said his ranch had been in his family for more than a hundred years, and he wasn’t moving. By the time you were born, we were in the process of getting divorced.”
“But that’s silly! Why didn’t you fight for your love?”
“Because what I felt wasn’t truly love. I never missed him the way I missed my parents and friends.” Mom sighed, looking down at her hands for a moment. “I met Brad when you got sick when you were just a few weeks old. I took the prescription to his pharmacy, and he filled it. We talked, and I agreed to go out with him.” She shrugged. “He knew I was getting a divorce and I had a tiny baby. He didn’t care. We married five days after the divorce was final. Alex gave up his parental rights, not wanting you torn between him and me. Brad adopted you when you were a year old.”
“But…why didn’t you ever tell me?”
Mom shook her head. “By the time you were old enough, we’d had the twins,” she said, speaking of her brother and sister who were two years younger than Alexis. “I never wanted you to feel like you were less loved than they were because you had a different father. You all grew up, and I thought I should tell you so many times, but I never felt it was important enough to actually do it. And now you found out, and I realize I was wrong the whole time.”
Alexis closed her eyes for a moment, wanting to yell at her mother, but she knew it would only hurt her. There was no reason to do that. “I see.”
Her mother reached for the scrapbook, opening it to the first page. “That was his receipt from his first meal at the restaurant. He was here to find some bulls for his herd.” Turning the page, she showed Alexis a copy of their marriage license.
As she flipped through the book, Alexis saw a whole marriage, which had ended much too soon. “I think it would have been good for you to get to know your father, and Brad and I talked about sending you to spend a summer with him many times. I even arranged it all with Alex, but in the end, I chickened out. I’m sure you realize that you were named after him. He was Alexander Thomas Tobias.”
“That’s where you got Thomasina from. I thought you hated me for years because you gave me that horrible middle name.”
Her mother laughed. “Your middle name is a small act of kindness toward the man who gave you life. He’s always known what you were doing. He got your school picture every year, and I’d send him snapshots of you taken at different places. He always got a copy of your report card, and he even paid for half of your college education. We didn’t need him to, but he was so excited you were going to college that he insisted.”
“He sounds like a really good man.”
“He was a better man than anyone but maybe Brad. Not seeing you was very hard for him, but he always wanted what was best for you. He’d send you Christmas and birthday presents, and I always gave them to you from your great aunt Alice.”
“I wondered why I never met her!” Alexis shook her head. “So he bought my first computer. My first phone. I thought Alice was the most wonderful aunt in the whole wide world!”
Her mother laughed. “It was all Alex. I didn’t want to claim I was giving you the gifts, and I would buy small gifts for Brent and Brittany from her, so they wouldn’t feel left out.”
“Do they know?” Alexis asked.
Her mother shook her head. “Your grandparents and Brad and I know. No one else.”
“And now I have to go for the reading of the will of a man I never met, but who took such an interest in my life. I don’t know how to do this.”
“You just go. It’s fine. Do you need money for the plane tickets?” she asked.
Alexis frowned. She hadn’t thought about getting there. “I think I’m fine.”
“Do you hate me?”
Alexis shook her head. “How could I hate you? You did what you thought was best, I’m sure, just as Dad did. And just as Alex did. How could I be upset that I had so many people loving me? I wish you’d told me, but I think I understand why you didn’t.” And she wasn’t angry, but she did feel as if she’d been robbed of a loving father. “I’m going to go home, get a little sleep, and arrange to fly out there on Sunday evening.”
Her mother hugged her again. “If you have any questions about him, I’m happy to answer,” Mom said as she headed for the door.
“Thanks for that,” Alexis said. “And you should tell Brent and Brittany. They have a right to know.”
As soon as she got home, Alexis looked up Boulder, Colorado, and typed in her father’s name. It looked like he’d never remarried, but he was very active and very generous. There were pictures of his ranch, and she shook her head, wondering about what he would have been like had they been together. She’d never know now.
