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Lilly's Promise

By Terrie Todd

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It’s happening again.
I’m in the perfect dress. Its dazzling white satin accentuates the tan I worked
on half the summer. The atmosphere intoxicates those gathered with the scent
of exotic flowers, the glow of flickering candlelight, and the glorious strains of a
string quartet. Libby, in her periwinkle dress, charms the crowd and drops cherry
blossoms just like she rehearsed. I’m floating along on Dad’s arm as he walks me
down the aisle between four hundred smiling guests.
Ryan stands at the front, a bit pale but handsome in his black tux. I focus on
him, my jaws already aching from smiling so much.
When we reach the front, Dad kisses me gently on the cheek and whispers,
“Love you, Princess.” He hands me off to Ryan and takes a seat beside Mum,
who dabs her eyes.
Ryan and I face each other. Pastor Ralph does his bit. We say our vows. ‘Til
death do us part. We exchange rings, and I take a second to admire the rose gold
band on my manicured hand.
My sister moves to the piano and begins to play “The Day Before You,”
which Ryan and I chose together. Becky’s pulling it off like a professional. As
she sings, we move to the registration table to sign the documents to make it
official. The final step. I sign first, then return the pen to the pastor, who hands
it to Ryan.
Ryan takes the pen.
That’s the point where I always wake up with a hammering headache. As
though my brain cannot process what happens next.
Another night ruined. Throwing off the covers, I sit up and run a hand
through my hair. No point trying to sleep. The dream always puts me in a mood.
It’s been ten years since my wedding day. Surely by now I should be over it, but
the stupid dream keeps coming and I can never predict when.
My sister Becky says I keep myself too busy and distracted, trying to forget,
when a few good therapy sessions might be all I need. Then she proceeds to the
guilt trip.
“You’re always too busy to come visit us, Diana,” she nags whenever we talk.
“How can you be the busy one when I’m the one raising three kids?”
She doesn’t mean it to sting. And I give her no reason to think it might.
Besides, I love my niece and nephews almost as much as I love my freedom.
I shake off the dream for what feels like the thousandth time and yank on
my bathrobe. Mouse materializes from wherever she was prowling and rubs up
against my leg. Her glossy grey fur shimmers in the dim light. I shuffle to the
kitchen and pour a little milk in her bowl.
“I shouldn’t be spoiling you like this.”
The cat merely meows her approval and laps the milk while I pour room
temperature tea from earlier in the evening into my favorite “You Are My
Sunshine” mug. Another gift from Dad. I stick it in the microwave and punch
some buttons. Three o’clock. My alarm will go off in two hours.
I take the tea to the table where my laptop sits open and pull up my email.
Mouse finishes her milk and hops onto my lap, curling up and purring in seconds.
How does she do that? No recurring, disturbing dreams for cats, I guess.
I stare at the new emails awaiting my attention. The first is from the DNA
Ancestry thing I did weeks ago. That’s my sister’s fault, too. Becky sent me one
of those DNA kits. That must be what pops up when you ask Alexa what to get
a single woman for her thirty-fifth birthday. Becky seems to think I already have
everything else. A lot she knows. I could use any number of things, from theater
tickets to a new garden hose. Free oil changes. A spa day. Better yet, a donation
to Compassion to send some little girl in a developing country to school.
The DNA kit sat unopened and forgotten in my desk drawer for a couple
of years. Then one day while decluttering, I found it again and sent my saliva
sample in the prepaid package to their state-of-the-art lab and forgot about it for
the second time.
Until now. I open the results.
The cousins and second cousins showing up on Mum’s side are exactly what
I expect, a bunch of Italian names. Dad’s side, however, confuses me. He never
had siblings, so I have no first cousins on his side. But in the second-to-thirdcousin
range, several people are listed with a confidence rating of “extremely
high.” Except their last names don’t add up. I recognize his mother’s maiden
name, Sampson. But our name is DeWitt. It doesn’t show up anywhere, not even
once. On the other hand, the name Tidsbury shows up too frequently to be a
coincidence. I don’t know anyone by that name.
Must be a mistake.
I want to call Dad, but it’s too early, even with the one-hour time difference.
And even if he is up, Dad’s hearing loss makes a normal phone conversation
frustrating. I generally find myself yelling and repeating until I’m exhausted. For
a retired doctor, Dad is surprisingly resistant to wearing his hearing aids and to
technology in general. At seventy-seven, he still says he’d rather write a good oldfashioned
letter, but Becky did finally manage to teach him to use email.
I fire one off to him.
Dad, are we related to anybody named Tidsbury? What can you
tell me about the accuracy of these DNA kits? Our name isn’t even
showing up on mine.
I hit send. Dad will probably tell me I’m wasting my time on useless,
unscientific nonsense. Then he’ll launch into his regular rant about how he
doesn’t understand why “that handsome firefighter” and I aren’t more than just
friends. He means Shane. “You’d be perfect for each other,” he tells me every time
we talk, even though they haven’t even met.
And he wonders why I don’t visit more.
Neither Dad nor Becky understand how I can be content as a single woman
with a best friend who happens to be male.
I scroll to the next email. It’s from Big Brothers/Big Sisters, reminding me
that Carly and I are due for our annual review, where we’ll sit down with our
worker and discuss how things are going and whether we want to continue with
the mentorship program.
I enter the meeting in my calendar and close my email. Carly’s gorgeous face
smiles at me from my desktop screen, her shiny black hair hanging nearly to her
waist. My fifteen-year-old “little sis” is smart and funny and intensely insecure.
I loved her instantly when they matched us almost five years ago. I don’t think I
could handle it if she wanted to end our relationship.
I close my laptop. I should crawl back into bed, but now Mouse is fast asleep,
and I hate to disturb her. I rest my head on my arms across the tabletop, thinking
of Carly. Her single mom and two younger brothers share a small apartment
close to my job at city hall, so it’s been convenient to do things with her. I pray I
haven’t given her any reason to stop being my little sister.
• • •
I awake, confused, to the beeping of the alarm clock. The sleeve of my bathrobe
is damp with drool. I stumble to the bedroom and turn off the alarm. Mouse
is stretched across my pillow. She lifts her head and gives me a look that says,
shouldn’t you be getting ready for work? before curling up again and closing her
golden eyes. Rotten cat.
• • •
I’m just nicely settled in at my desk when my phone pings. It’s an email from
Dad. I wait until my coffee break to read it, completely expecting a scolding
for wasting time and money on the silly DNA thing—even if the money was
Becky’s. Instead, my father is full of surprises.
Dear Diana,
Your letter intrigues me. DNA… deoxyribonucleic acid, the carrier
of genetic information. Fascinating stuff. I believe your results are
accurate, but it’s a very long story. I only learned it shortly before my
mother passed away. I wish you could have known her. I’m not sure
why I never attempted to tell you girls everything your grandmother
shared with me, but guess what? I’ve decided to write a book! My
memoirs. Oh, I doubt I’ll ever publish it or anything, but it would be
good for you and Becky to know my whole story. As they say, those
who refuse to learn from history are doomed to repeat it. I’d hate
that for you.
Here’s the thing. After hunting and pecking out the first chapter on
this computer, I’ve concluded I’d do better writing it out in long hand.
I really need help. Someone who can not only type it up but make
corrections as they go. Would you consider this, Princess? Take a
look at what I’ve done so far and let me know if you think it’s worth
pursuing.
In fairness, I can’t tell my story without first telling my mother’s. For
you see, Diana, neither you nor I would be here at all if my mother had
succeeded with her plan back in 1941. And to understand that plan,
we really need to go all the way back to Mother’s childhood in the
1920s and a secret far too heavy for any eight-year-old child to carry.
Let me know if you want to tackle this project with me.
Lovingly,
Dad

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