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"I couldn’t"

I looked at the clock; it was time

Car doors opened and slammed shut around us The visitor doors were unlocked

"You’re up," Kaidan said

It took awhile to get through security They had to look for the fax Patti had sent giving h uard who took my name becahter

"First visitor Johnny LaGray’s had in seventeen years," he stated

Not likely, I thought, envisioning a steady strea at the prison’s securityand holding hands were fine intoto s and handshakes were not on enda

He explained that my father would be notified that he had a visitor, but he had the right to refuse to see me

The other visitors and I were led into a room the size of a sned places Misuards I sat down in a chair as wobbly as my stomach The rooh-pitched voices of children The general atray aurasand chains clanging et sick Prisoners entered single file, hands cuffed in front of thee junized him at once, head shaved soatee fro, pointed beard with a bit of gray His badge shone a deep, dark yellow And then I saw his eyes and reht brown, curved doard at the corners, the sauard marched him toward me I saw concern and hope in his eyes, not the evil I’d feared As he got closer, every shred of anger I’d been harboring fell from me

He stood in front of me now, on the other side of the table, and I found , too Both our eyes filled with moisture Maybe it was him I needed to thank for the curse of overactive tear ducts

The guard unlockedhis ankles shackled, and we reached out for each other across the table His hands arh Mine were cold from nerves, but they would tha

"Have a seat, LaGray," the guard said, and we sat, never looking away frouard left us

"I can’t believe you’re here," he said His voice was as scratchy and gruff as I recalled "I wrote so many letters over the years," he continued, "but it wasn’t safe to send them to you And I wanted you to have a chance at a norently as I could

He nodded and sniffed He looked like a hard ht about that I hoped you would learn froht"

"Sister Ruth?" I asked "I haven’t met her yet She talked to my adoptive mother"

"Have they treated you well, the people who raised you?"