rekkidblogga

Keep digging

After my little nieces and my "adopted" niece (their 10-year-old friend who we love like family) made a full day of it, we started off for their homes and were having a great time in the car when I heard rumblings about something that had fallen beside the seat. And things suddenly got too quiet. A quick glance backwards showed my adopted niece staring straight ahead, her face flooded with tears. I'd had no idea she'd been crying; it broke my heart. "She lost part of her necklace that her friend made for her," my oldest niece, sitting with her, said.

Pulling off the highway, I parked and started digging - literally - under the back seat. It was a team effort. My 10-year-old niece gamely tried to help, holding up the part of the seat I'd lifted just enough to wedge my weak left hand beneath, feebly fumbling around for the little trinket. My littlest niece offered to try her tiny hand in place of mine. Desperately, I asked my extra niece if she was sure this was where she'd dropped the piece. "Yes," she replied anxiously, "it fell right there - beside the money." The money? There's no money, I said, just the bolt holding down the seat carriage and... Oh, God. That's it. It's so tiny. Please don't let me drop it. Please... Please...

Once the little blue-and-white swirled heart, so delicate and small, had been safely tucked away in Niece No. Three's Hello Kitty backpack, there was a promise of no more tears, only smiles. It's why you pull off the road. It's why you keep looking when you don't know where to look. It's why you don't stop until you find what you're not even sure you've been looking for.

posted by rekkidbraka @ 12:34 AM