I stood frozen beside the pool, one hand wrapped tightly around my wine glass, staring at the back of Harold’s ear while my daughter’s voice repeated in my head.
“Mommy, Daddy’s there.”
I couldn’t shake those words.
Let me back up.
***
My name is Alison. I’m 37, and a year ago, cancer took my husband, Mike, leaving me alone with our daughter, Mia.
She had been three then.
Now she was four.
Most nights, she still asked, “When is Daddy coming home?”
Harold had been Mike’s oldest and closest friend.
Our families had known each other for about 10 years, but the two of them had been friends even longer.
There had been years of barbecues, fishing trips, vacations, and inside jokes nobody else understood.
And, conveniently or not, Harold was also my boss at the firm.
After Mike’s funeral, Harold simply began showing up.
Sometimes he brought groceries.
When my washing machine died, he replaced it.
Other days, he sat cross-legged on the rug building Lego castles with Mia while I slept on the couch from sheer exhaustion.
If something around the house needed fixing, Harold usually took care of it before I could even ask.
I was incredibly grateful.
And if I’m honest, I was also a little ashamed of how much I had begun relying on him.
“You know he doesn’t have to do all that,” Rachel, my co-worker and friend, told me the morning before the pool party.
She had cornered me in the office kitchen with two mugs of coffee.
“He’s just being kind, Rach.”
“Alison,” she lowered her voice. “I love Harold. But you’re a young widow on his payroll, and he’s practically living at your house. People are talking. Not mean talk. Just… talk.”
What happened next changed everything… FULL STORY on the next page.
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