I didn’t know how much time we had left.
That same evening, my father handed me an envelope.
“Take them to see the ocean.”
Inside was enough money for plane tickets and three nights at a hotel.
“Where did this come from?”
“My savings.”
Two weeks later, we were standing beside the ocean.
When Lily and Ben saw the water for the first time, they stopped and stood there holding hands.
Then they ran toward the waves.
For the first time in months, I heard my children truly laugh.
But that evening, when we returned to the hotel, someone knocked on our door.
The hotel manager was standing outside.
He was holding a dark blue box.
He looked at me very seriously.
“Mrs. Miller, there’s something about this trip you don’t know.”
