Thomas smiled.
“Hi, Pumpkin.”
The nickname stayed with me for the rest of his life.
My mother married him soon after.
For two years, we were an ordinary little family.
Then, when I was seven, my mother died in a car accident.
My grandparents came to take care of me. They loved me, but they assumed Thomas would move on.
After all, I wasn’t his child.
Not technically.
Thomas listened quietly.
Then he looked at me, sitting on the couch with that battered teddy bear in my arms.
He turned back to my grandparents.
“She’s my daughter.”
When my grandfather tried to respond, Thomas repeated it.
“She’s my daughter.”
That ended the discussion.
He never remarried.
Instead, our family grew.
When I was nine, Thomas adopted Michael and Mara, twins who had spent years moving between temporary homes.
Two years later came Noah and Susan, siblings who entered our lives through foster care and eventually became ours permanently.
