I Gave Up 22 Years of My Life Raising My Triplet Nieces – What They Did at Their College Graduation Made Me Drop to My Knees – Page 9

I didn’t blame them for it. I just couldn’t stop thinking about it.

There was a fear under all of it.

***

The morning of the triplets’ graduation, I sat in my truck in the parking lot for a full 20 minutes before I could make myself get out.

I was 49. My beard had gone gray in patches. My knee hurt from a fall off a ladder two summers earlier and had never quite healed.

I’d brought a cheap camera, which I didn’t fully know how to use, and it was shaking in my hand.

And in my wallet, behind the expired insurance card and a food receipt, I’d kept Daniel’s original note. It was faded, but still readable.

I’d brought a cheap camera.

I unfolded it with both hands.

I wondered if the girls would mention Daniel today. I wondered, even worse, if they’d wish he’d come instead.