“You care for my daughter,” Ranee says, so sure of the statement she doesn’t need to ask. “And she for you.”
“No,” David says, clearly hesitating to answer the question. “She wants nothing to do with me.”
“That’s not what I saw in her eyes.” Ranee pauses, trying to find her way through unfamiliar territory. She rarely discusses her daughters’ love lives with them or anyone else. Deep within her, she feared hearing their stories, learning how their childhood affected them in adulthood. “I apologize if I am speaking out of turn, but I know what I saw. My daughter is in love with you, I am sure.” She thinks about her relationship with Brent, what defined them. “That is different from love for someone familiar—something I have learned in my advanced years. Love is sometimes demanded, expected when you have blood relations. But to be in love with another, to care for them more than for yourself—that is powerful. And you, you are concerned, worried for her?”
“Yes,” David answers, quietly. He glances out the window. Taking the opportunity to study his profile, Ranee sees whom her daughter has fallen in love with, his strength, his character. Everything Brent is not, could never be.
“Then why the hurt, the distance?” Ranee demands, confused.
“That’s something that you should ask her,” David says quietly, turning back toward her. His voice holds respect, both for Ranee and Sonya. “I don’t want to presume to speak for her.”
“I understand.” Ranee falls quiet, watching the rise and fall of Brent’s chest as the machine pumps oxygen into him. “The vote today must have surprised you,” Ranee says at last. “A family so quick to release the man who raised them, provided for them. To let him go with just one word, an agreement.” She reaches again for the mangalsutra that had a permanent place around her neck for years. Only when she touches bare skin does she remember again having removed it. “Is it always so simple for a family?”
“No,” David says truthfully. “But Sonya told me what he did.” He pauses, staring at Brent. “How he hurt all of you. I can’t imagine what that must have been like.”
Ranee lowers her head, hiding her shock. Each of them has hidden the secret for so long, gone to extreme lengths to keep anyone from learning it, and yet Sonya, in a few short months of knowing this man, has revealed to him the one thing she has been running from her entire life.
“It destroyed her,” Ranee shares, understanding dawning. Sonya was refusing to love this man, refusing to accept what he was offering her. Ranee could now acknowledge her part in that, recognize her inaction had caused her daughter to react this way. With that knowledge came acceptance, an understanding of what she has to do. Her words will change each one of their paths irretrievably. “But I helped,” Ranee admits, confiding in this stranger as her daughter had already done. “I made her believe she wasn’t wanted, she wasn’t loved.”
“I don’t think . . .” David starts, but Ranee holds up a hand to silence him.
“My daughter must know the truth. She can never be free of him until she does,” Ranee says. “She will never be able to acknowledge or trust her love for you until then.”
“Why don’t you tell her this?” David asks.
“Because I haven’t earned the right,” Ranee admits. “She was the one I left behind, the one I couldn’t be a mother to.” She notices his tie—a mix of superheroes. “Are you a parent, David?”
“Yes. I have a daughter.”
“You would do anything for her,” Ranee says, confidently.
“Of course. Like any parent.” David sounds self-effacing.