“This is Victoria,” Richard said softly. “She’s the woman I told you about.”
I knelt to Nathan’s level and smiled.
“Hi, Nathan. Your dad says you love dinosaurs. I brought you something.”
Inside the small gift bag was a book about fossils and ancient creatures.
Later, Richard told me Nathan slept with that book under his pillow for weeks.
Six months later, when Richard proposed, I didn’t answer right away.
Instead, I asked Nathan if he was okay with it.
Only after he nodded did I say yes.
Nathan’s mother had passed away two years before our wedding.
I never tried to take her place.
I simply created my own place in his life, quietly and with care.
Richard and I never had children together.
We talked about it sometimes, but life kept moving and the timing never felt right.
Truthfully, our home already felt full.
Nathan filled it with laughter, questions, and meaning.
Then, five years ago, everything fell apart.
Richard died suddenly from a stroke at just fifty-three.
Nathan had just received his college acceptance letter.
I will never forget the look on his face when I told him his father was gone.
