Parental Decisions

Janine sat with her shoulders rounded in desolate fatigue. Here in her daughter's bedroom she was surrounded by the moody good looks of boy band posters and the vague smell of sports socks.

She heaved a sigh and gave in to gravity, laying softly on her little girl's pillow. Not so little now, she reminded herself. Josie was fourteen, as tall as her, as brash as her and completely unreadable since entering puberty. However, she would always be Janine's little girl and no mother ever wanted to be the one to inflict pain on her child.

She clenched the unopened letter in her hand and thought of the intolerable position Stephen had left her in. Well, not really unopened. The police had wanted to examine it and provide her with a copy so the original could be held by the coroner as evidence. Huh, evidence? Who needed that when his suicide had been witnessed. A tear rolled unbidden down her cheek and she angrily brushed it away. It was just like her ex to leave her to deliver the news, and the letter.

She wanted to read it. Every bit of her needed to know what he had to say to his little girl before he had blown his brains out and left her half an orphan. But then that would make her violate something precious; Josie's trust. This bloody letter wasn't addressed to her. Every thing that needed to be said between the exes had been either said or forgotten over the years apart.

Her stomach hurt as she looked at the police officer's hand copied envelope addressed to Miss Josie Harper. Horrible, horrible, horrible. Perhaps she should just put it away for now. Wait until she had broken the news, comforted the grief, attended the funeral and reading of the will. Then what? "Hey, Josie! Got a letter from your daddy here, you interested?"

Janine sent her thoughts to remembering an old song that Stephen had played non-stop in school. Something about everything having a reason and a time, or something. She never did get the oldies he liked to listen to.

The envelope wasn't perfectly closed and the smell of copier toner was strong when she put it on the pillow beside her. Examining it so closely almost made it become a less personal thing. Once Josie had a hold of it, Janine might never know what it contained. What if that made her a bad mother? What if the contents sent her little girl into hell and she couldn't help her back? Maybe it was the sign of good parenting to open the damned thing and share the words that idiot had left behind in the aftermath. She continued to look at it laying mutely next to her.

"Hey, anyone home?" A familiar voice called up the stairs, home from school.

(482 wds)