She barely knew me. Daniel had known this conversation was coming. He'd prepared for it, rehearsed it, lost sleep over it for 2 years. But now that it was here, every carefully crafted explanation vanished from his mind. Lily, and don't say you'll tell me when I'm older.
I'm nine. I'm old enough. She was right. She was old enough and she deserved the truth. Okay, Daniel said slowly.
But this is a long story, and some parts might be hard to hear. I can handle it. Daniel looked at his daughter. this fierce, brilliant, stubborn girl who had Victoria's face and Rebecca's laugh and his own inability to back down from a fight. She could handle it. He was the one who wasn't ready.
But he'd promised Victoria. He'd promised to tell Lily the truth when she was ready. Do you remember when we talked about your tummy mommy? He began the one who loved me but couldn't take care of me. Yeah.
I told you Miss Victoria knew your tummy mommy. that they were close. Lily nodded. That wasn't exactly true. Daniel took a breath. Victoria didn't know your tummy, Mommy.
Victoria was your tummy, Mommy. Lily stared at him. For a long moment, she didn't move, didn't speak, didn't even seem to breathe. What? Miss Victoria was your birth mother, Lily.
She gave you up for adoption when she was 18 because her parents forced her to. She spent 15 years trying to find you and she finally did 3 months before she died. That's not possible. Lily's voice was shaking. She would have told me.
She would have said something. She was going to. The day she died, she was supposed to meet me at the park. She was going to tell me everything so we could tell you together. Daniel's voice cracked.
But she never made it. Lily stood so fast her chair toppled backward. You're lying. I'm not lying, baby. You are.
Miss Victoria was just She was just nice to me because she liked you. She wasn't my She couldn't be my Lily's face crumpled. She turned and ran out of the kitchen. And Daniel heard her bedroom door slam hard enough to shake the walls. He sat alone at the table, head in his hands, wondering if he'd made the right choice.
For 3 days, Lily refused to speak to him. She went to school, did her homework, ate her meals, but she did it all in silence with a wall of ice between them that Daniel couldn't penetrate. "On the fourth day, Rachel came to visit." "She's not talking to you?" Rachel asked, settling onto Daniel's couch with a cup of tea. "Not a word. She looks at me like I'm a stranger.
You told her the truth. That's terrifying for a 9-year-old. Was I wrong? Should I have waited? Rachel considered the question.
No, she needed to know. But knowing and accepting are two different things. She sat down her tea. Have you shown her Victoria's journal? Not yet.