Having made sure Sissy was settled safely in her room downstairs in the boarding house, Adam made his way back up to his room. Closing the door quietly behind him, he leaned heavily against it, and he stayed there for a few moments before his legs started to feel shaky. He crossed to the bed and, turning around he collapsed onto it, his eyes staring straight ahead, his mind struggling to comprehend.

I’m a father.

He reached for the pitcher on his nightstand and poured himself a glass of water, but then Sissy’s trembling voice came back to him, and his throat was suddenly too tight to drink.

“They took the baby away as soon as it was born,” she’d said. “They wouldn’t let me hold or see my baby. I don’t even know if it was boy or girl.”

I . . . I was a father.

     Sissy had continued as tears flowed down her cheeks. “But I heard the baby cry. I heard one of the nurses talking. She said someone would be coming for my baby the next day, that they’d found it a home . . .”

I might be a father.

     Adam dropped his head into his hands. It was almost too much for him to take in; the possibility had never even entered his mind. Here was yet another piece of information that had been kept from him, another person torn from him . . . His own flesh and blood.

Getting up, he began to pace the room, swinging his hands to try and relieve some of the nervous energy threatening to send him over the edge, and then a new thought formed. He stopped, turning his gaze toward the door. Outside that door, just down the stairs and a few doors to the left, was the mother of his child—a woman who had endured more suffering than he was capable of comprehending, a woman who had truly lost everyone and everything that meant something to her—except for him. His heart began to ache, and he unconsciously rubbed his chest as if to relieve the pain.

I have a child. No, we have a child. It was . . . our child that was taken.

Adam’s knees began to feel weak again, and this time, he picked a spot on the floor to sit, resting his back against the wall. The coolness of the bricks helped to ease his strained muscles, and he leaned his head back, allowing his eyes to close. Immediately, visions of the life he might have had began to flash through his mind. He pictured himself lifting Sissy across the threshold of the little cottage where they’d spent their wedding night. He envisioned it with added rooms, and in the corner where the washtub was kept, instead, a cradle. Then the image of a tiny babe wrapped in soft blankets with its little fists balled up next to round cheeks filled his mind, and opening his eyes quickly, he brought his hand up, pinching the bridge of his nose.

He wanted to jump up and shout, to beat the walls, and kick the bedframe over. It wasn’t fair! How could life be so cruel? And then came to his mind the gentle rumble of a deep voice.

“Son, there are some questions that only serve to drive a man crazy, or make him miserable—what if? Why? If only . . . Sometimes, you just have to be willing to let it all go in order to start again. A man can only live one day at time, one hour, one moment. If you keep trying to take on all the cares of yesterday and the worries of tomorrow, you’ll end up robbing yourself of today. And that is a gift you don’t want to waste.”

Taking a deep breath, Adam pursed his lips. A gift? He mulled over the thought and soon found himself nodding his head. Sissy was out of prison . . . She’d told him of the life born out of their love, and for the first time since hearing the news, he allowed the slightest of smiles to work the corners of his mouth. Picking himself up off the floor, Adam undressed and got ready for bed. Tomorrow, the search would begin, and he was determined not to waste a minute of it.

 

 

It was still early the next morning when Adam finished dressing, and he had to force himself to wait until he heard noises coming from the kitchen below his room before he headed down the stairs. He stopped near Sissy’s door, debating whether or not to knock, when Jenny came around the corner with a load of towels in her arms.

“She’s gone out,” Jenny said. “Went the back way just before the sun came up.”

Adam’s pulse quickened and he told himself to remain calm, but an hour later, when she still hadn’t come back, he finally headed out to find her. He’d asked Jenny if he could borrow a horse, and a few minutes later, he steered the animal toward Charlottesville. He didn’t know where Sissy had gone, but if she was thinking along the same lines as he’d been last night, it was possible she’d gone looking for her lawyer.

I wish she would have waited for me.

He rode as far as the first set of crossroads and glanced up at the wooden signs. The one to the left said 2 miles Easton Prison. Adam turned his horse to the right, but only made it a few yards before something began pulling at his senses. He stopped the animal and turned once more toward the prison road.

Now why would she go there?

Adam startled and then chuckled when his horse stamped its feet and tossed its head with impatience. “You remind me of my buddy back home,” he said, giving the horse’s neck a pat. Deciding to follow his gut, he spurred his horse on toward Easton Prison. He followed the dirt road, one he had traveled nearly every day for over two months when Sissy had first been imprisoned. As he came over the last hill, he stood in the stirrups, gazing around until his eyes came to rest on a large cherry tree. Sitting on the ground beneath its outstretched branches was Sissy. Adam kicked the horse to a slow canter until he drew near and then he jumped to the ground.

“Sissy? Are you all right?”

Sissy jumped, but then relaxed when she saw him.

“I know . . . I should have been back a while ago,” she answered, not sounding the least repentant, “but the sun was rising when I got here, and everything was so peaceful. I was afraid that if I got up, I’d find out it was all dream and suddenly find myself back on the inside.”

Adam lowered himself to the ground beside her and placed a hand on top of the one she held in her lap.

“Why did you come back here?”

“I had a dream last night. I was in the prison again, but this time I was on a different floor, one where I couldn’t see this tree. I asked one of the guards about it, and he told me it had been chopped down. When I woke up this morning, I . . . I just had to come and see . . . if it was still here.”

Adam’s brows drew together, he looked up at the one window along the stark brick wall and then at the tree behind him. “You could see this tree while you were a prisoner?”

“Only sometimes . . . when I was able to get close to the window. I’d stand on my toes and catch a glimpse of it. It’s a cherry tree you know?”

Adam smiled. “Yes, I know. A certain young, love-sick, university student planted it here a long time ago.”

Sissy pulled away from Adam and looked up, searching his eyes. “You . . . you mean, you planted this tree here.”

Adam dropped his eyes and turned away. “On the day I left. My pa waited on the top of the hill over there while I planted it. It was only a small sapling then, but I hoped it would grow, and that maybe someday, you might be able to see it from that window.”

Adam turned back to watch Sissy’s reaction. Her eyes were full of tears.

“I . . . I used to,” Sissy’s voice was soft. “I used to wish on it every time I’d see it in blossom.”

Adam reached out to wipe a tear that had trickled to her chin. “And what did you wish for?”

Sissy hesitated for a moment, and a slight blush came over her cheeks. Then, with eyes sparkling from unshed tears, she answered, “For the pleasure of your company.”

Adam’s stomach clenched sharply at the words—words he’d used in another lifetime. He looked up again at the brick walls, trying to imagine Sissy inside of them. What had life been like for her? How had she survived so intact?

“What is it?” Sissy asked, bringing him out of his reverie.

“I was just thinking. What would have happened if I hadn’t . . . if we’d never met. Things would have been different for you.”

Sissy looked bewildered. “Different?”

“I should have thought things through more thoroughly. Maybe, if I had waited for your uncle to get back, tried to talk to him, you wouldn’t have ended up in prison.”

Sissy grew quiet, gazing out toward the solid brick walls. Finally, she turned to him. “I was in prison long before I met you, Adam. With that prison,” she gestured toward the foreboding building, “I just traded walls.” She paused for a moment before continuing. “Different walls . . . and different pain. I was lucky—no one ever hurt me the way my uncle used to, but . . . but there were times when I would have welcomed that pain back again if I could just be with Meg, and you.”

Adam worked to swallow the lump in his throat as Sissy laid a hand over her stomach.

“I never knew being lonely could hurt so much,” she said.

Adam’s own stomach was twisting in pain, and he stood up suddenly. He leaned a hand against the solid tree trunk and turned away, unable to bring himself to look at her. Sissy quickly stood up beside him and laid a hand on his back.

“Please don’t,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

Adam held back a bitter laugh. “You’re sorry?” he asked. “Of all the people I have ever met, you are the last one of them to have anything to be sorry about. It’s the rest of us that should be apologizing to you.”

Sissy placed another hand on his arm and he turned to face her. “You think too highly of me, Adam. There were many times when I cursed the world and the people in it. Even . . . even times when I despaired so low that I thought I could end it all by taking my life.”

Adam remembered that his father said there were times she’d been transferred to a mental institution, and he blinked rapidly against the sting building in his eyes.

“But,” she continued, “when things would get better, and I was thinking more clearly, a memory of you or Meg would come to me, and I’d remember that somewhere, Meg was free. She wasn’t with him anymore and he couldn’t hurt her, and wherever she was, she was safe from Mr. Denton. Those thoughts are what kept me going, that and hoping someday I’d see her again.”

Adam stood up straight, and nodded. “Then let’s get going,” he said aloud. Inwardly he prayed more fervently than he ever had before that they would find Meg safe and well, for Sissy’s sake.