Poor Huck.
“Does Rowan know?” Bailey’s voice was barely audible.
“No.” Sierra shook her head. “I don’t think so. Although one good look at the kid…”
“Right?” Bailey shook her head. “Girl, that man’s been a heartthrob since first grade. And your son Huck has his father’s aura. Can’t pry the girls away from him.”
“Oh, I’m in trouble.” She leaned back, her hands pressed to her face. “Huck thinks his father’s dead—because, well, his father was dead. And he’s turned the man into someone larger than life. We don’t talk about him often, but sometimes he asks and…” She looked at Bailey. “Now what do I say? ‘Your dad’s alive, but he didn’t care enough to tell us’?”
Bailey covered Sierra’s hand with hers.
Sierra stood up and walked to the window overlooking the playground, where a few kids were still waiting for rides. “You don’t understand. When I found out I was pregnant, Rowan had already broken his first promise. He told me not to write to him at boot camp, that he’d call when it was over. But he never called. And then I wrote to him, but the letter came back. I didn’t know his rank, his address…” She lifted a shoulder. “And then…then Mack called and said Rowan had been deployed early, no leave.”
“So you decided not to tell him about the baby.”
“I decided not to tell him about the baby because his stepfather was a monster, and I didn’t want Rowan coming home to that situation because of me. Because of a child he never planned to have.” Sierra pressed her forehead against the cool glass. “I thought I was protecting him.”
“And later? When you dated Mike?”
“I thought maybe Huck needed a father figure.”
“Mike’s a good man. What happened?”
She turned to Bailey. “What happened was that Mike wasn’t Rowan, and I wasn’t in love with Mike, and building a relationship on that foundation was a disaster waiting to happen.” Sierra turned back to Bailey. “It’s possible that Huck isn’t the only one who built up his father to superhero status.”
“And then?”
“And then I was going to tell Rowan. Had actually convinced myself that he deserved to know, that Huck deserved to know his father. I even wrote the letter, explaining everything, asking him to come meet his son.”
Bailey waited.
“Two days before I mailed it, Mack showed up on my doorstep with the notification that Rowan Wallace had been killed in action. Classified mission, body not recoverable, survived by his stepfather and half brother.” Sierra’s voice went flat. “So I went to the memorial and let Huck think his father was a hero who died serving his country. He was only seven, so it wasn’t hard to make him believe that he’d left for war before he was born.”
“That’s not entirely a lie.”
“It’s not entirely the truth either. I even hung his flag on the wall, even though it wasn’t officially mine.”
“How’d you end up with the flag?”
She sighed. “I don’t know. Mack showed up one day with it. He’d clearly been in a fight. He just handed it to me and walked away. And I…I kept it.”
Bailey stood up and walked around her desk, leaning against it so she could face Sierra directly. “What are you going to do now?”
“I don’t know.”
“You have to tell them both.”
“Do I? Huck’s got a good life. He’s happy, well-adjusted, smart, talented. Why blow that up because his supposedly dead father decided to come back to town?”
“Because that father is very much alive and has the right to know his child exists. And because that child has the right to know his father.”
“What if Rowan doesn’t want the responsibility?”
“What if he does?”
Sierra moved away from the window, pacing the small classroom space between desks sized for fourth graders. “You didn’t see him this morning, Bailey. He’s different. Harder. Ten years of whatever he’s been doing have changed him.”
“Of course they have. He was—maybe still is—a soldier. That has to have changed him. And you’ve changed too.”
