![\"\"](\"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/frgtp-240x300.png\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
When my six-year-old granddaughter handed me a drawing with \u201cI LOVE YOU NANA\u201d written across the top in big, crooked letters, I nearly cried.<\/p>\n
It was the kind of picture most people would probably smile at for a moment before sticking it to the refrigerator. The yellow sun took up almost half the page, the flowers were taller than the house, and the two figures in the middle had arms long enough to touch the edges of the paper.<\/p>\n
But I knew exactly who they were.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s me,\u201d my granddaughter, Maisie, announced proudly, tapping the smaller figure with one finger. \u201cAnd that\u2019s you, Nana.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI guessed that.\u201d<\/p>\n
She narrowed her eyes at me.<\/p>\n
\u201cHow?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause mine has gray hair.\u201d<\/p>\n
Maisie burst out laughing.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t have a gray crayon!\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat explains everything.\u201d<\/p>\n
She climbed onto my lap and looked at the picture again.<\/p>\n
\u201cDo you really like it?\u201d<\/p>\n
I wrapped my arms around her.<\/p>\n
\u201cI love it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cLike really love it?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cMore than you know.\u201d<\/p>\n
She smiled and rested her cheek against my shoulder.<\/p>\n
Maybe I was more emotional about that little picture than most grandmothers would have been, but there was a reason.<\/p>\n
I had grown up in a home where affection was rare. My parents provided what we needed, but warmth was something I mostly saw in other families. There were no hugs before school, no bedtime kisses, and almost never an \u201cI love you\u201d unless someone was leaving for a very long time.<\/p>\n
As a child, I used to promise myself that when I had my own family someday, things would be different.<\/p>\n
My children would know they were loved.<\/p>\n
My grandchildren would never have to wonder.<\/p>\n
So sitting there with Maisie wrapped around me and her little declaration of love in my hands, I felt as though I was holding proof that the family I had once dreamed about was real.<\/p>\n
That evening, after Maisie went home, I left the drawing on the side table beside my chair.<\/p>\n
I must have looked at it twenty times.<\/p>\n
My husband, Conrad, finally noticed.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019ve been staring at that thing all night.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI know.\u201d<\/p>\n
He smiled faintly.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe has your artistic talent.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI hope not. I can barely draw a circle.\u201d<\/p>\n
I picked up the paper and traced one of Maisie\u2019s uneven letters.<\/p>\n
Then an idea occurred to me.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou know what I\u2019m thinking?\u201d<\/p>\n
Conrad looked over.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat sentence usually costs money.\u201d<\/p>\n
I laughed.<\/p>\n
\u201cI might get this tattooed.\u201d<\/p>\n
He blinked.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNot the whole sheet, obviously. Just the drawing and the words. Small.\u201d<\/p>\n
I touched the inside of my forearm.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaybe here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Conrad looked at the picture, then at my arm.<\/p>\n
For a second, I expected him to say I had lost my mind. I was sixty-one years old and had never had a tattoo in my life.<\/p>\n
Instead, he simply shrugged.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf that\u2019s what you want.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s all you have to say?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat do you want me to say?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know. Something.\u201d<\/p>\n
He turned back toward the television.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s your arm, Lorna.\u201d<\/p>\n
I took that as indifference.<\/p>\n
Three days later, I made an appointment at a small tattoo studio recommended by a woman I worked with.<\/p>\n
I almost canceled that morning.<\/p>\n
Walking into a tattoo shop at my age made me feel strangely self-conscious. Everyone there seemed younger, cooler, and far more certain about what they were doing.<\/p>\n
The artist, however, made me comfortable almost immediately.<\/p>\n
She studied Maisie\u2019s picture and smiled.<\/p>\n
\u201cYour granddaughter drew this?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYes.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou want me to clean up the lines a little?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n
She looked up.<\/p>\n
\u201cNot even the lettering?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cEspecially not the lettering. If you make it perfect, it won\u2019t be hers anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n
So she copied every uneven line.<\/p>\n
When it was finished, I sat staring at my arm much longer than I expected.<\/p>\n
There was Maisie\u2019s ridiculous yellow sun.<\/p>\n
Our long stick arms.<\/p>\n
And beneath them, those crooked little words:<\/p>\n
I LOVE YOU NANA.<\/p>\n
It made me emotional all over again.<\/p>\n
But Maisie\u2019s reaction was even better.<\/p>\n
The following afternoon, the moment she saw my arm, she screamed.<\/p>\n
\u201cNANA!\u201d<\/p>\n
She grabbed my wrist before I reminded her the tattoo was still sore.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s my picture!\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt certainly is.\u201d<\/p>\n
She stared at it as if I had put one of her drawings in a museum.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou put it on your skin!\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI told you I was keeping it forever.\u201d<\/p>\n
Maisie\u2019s eyes widened.<\/p>\n
\u201cForever forever?\u201d<\/p>\n
I smiled.<\/p>\n
\u201cForever forever.\u201d<\/p>\n
For the next half hour, she walked around telling everyone she was now a \u201creal artist\u201d because Nana had her artwork tattooed.<\/p>\n
I drove home feeling happier than I had in weeks.<\/p>\n
Then Conrad saw it.<\/p>\n
He was standing in the kitchen when I came through the door. I had barely put my handbag down when his eyes dropped to my arm.<\/p>\n
His entire expression changed.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat the hell is that?\u201d<\/p>\n
At first, I thought he was joking.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe tattoo.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou actually did it?\u201d<\/p>\n
I stared at him.<\/p>\n
\u201cI told you I was going to.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou said you were thinking about it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYes, and you said it was my arm.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat doesn\u2019t mean I thought you\u2019d actually go through with something like this.\u201d<\/p>\n
Something in his tone wiped the smile from my face.<\/p>\n
\u201cSomething like what?\u201d<\/p>\n
He stepped closer and looked at my arm.<\/p>\n
\u201cA tattoo, Lorna. At your age.\u201d<\/p>\n
I frowned.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat does my age have to do with it?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt looks trashy.\u201d<\/p>\n
The word hit me harder than I expected.<\/p>\n
\u201cExcuse me?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou heard me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a picture our granddaughter drew.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat doesn\u2019t mean you needed to put it permanently on your body.\u201d<\/p>\n
I gave a small, disbelieving laugh.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou knew exactly what I was thinking of doing.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo. You mentioned some silly idea while I was watching television.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd you had every opportunity to say you hated it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI shouldn\u2019t have had to.\u201d<\/p>\n
That stopped me.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat does that mean?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt means we\u2019re married. You should have thought about how I would feel before doing something permanent.\u201d<\/p>\n
I stared at the man I had been married to for thirty-two years.<\/p>\n
During those thirty-two years, my body had carried two children. I had gained weight, lost weight, had surgery, grown wrinkles, and watched gray slowly replace brown in my hair.<\/p>\n
Never once had Conrad made me feel ashamed of any of it.<\/p>\n
Until now.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t realize I needed permission.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t say permission.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt sounds very much like permission.\u201d<\/p>\n
His jaw tightened.<\/p>\n
Then he looked at the tattoo again and said something I would spend days hearing in my head.<\/p>\n
\u201cWell, if you want the truth, I don\u2019t find you attractive with it.\u201d<\/p>\n
I went still.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t like tattoos.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re telling me that after thirty-two years of marriage, one small tattoo makes you stop being attracted to me?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not just the tattoo.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThen what is it?\u201d<\/p>\n
He hesitated.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s what it says about you.\u201d<\/p>\n
I almost laughed again, except nothing about the moment felt funny.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd what exactly does it say about me?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat you don\u2019t care what I think.\u201d<\/p>\n
I looked down at Maisie\u2019s little stick figures.<\/p>\n
Only hours earlier, they had made me feel loved.<\/p>\n
Now my husband had somehow turned them into evidence that I was a bad wife.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat do you want me to do?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n
\u201cHave it removed.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThen don\u2019t expect me to pretend I\u2019m happy about it.\u201d<\/p>\n
He walked out of the kitchen before I could answer.<\/p>\n
For the next several days, our house became painfully quiet.<\/p>\n
Conrad wasn\u2019t openly cruel. In some ways, that made it worse.<\/p>\n
He simply withdrew.<\/p>\n
He ate dinner quickly and went upstairs. If I sat near him, he found something else to do. At night, he turned away from me without saying goodnight.<\/p>\n
At first, I stayed angry.<\/p>\n
Then, little by little, I began questioning myself.<\/p>\n
Marriage requires compromise. I knew that. Maybe I should have pressed him harder for an opinion before getting the tattoo.<\/p>\n
One evening, I actually searched tattoo removal clinics on my phone.<\/p>\n
I stared at the prices and the photographs of faded ink.<\/p>\n
Then I imagined Maisie looking at my arm.<\/p>\n
Where did my picture go, Nana?<\/p>\n
I closed the page immediately.<\/p>\n
What was I supposed to tell her?<\/p>\n
That Grandpa thought her drawing made me trashy?<\/p>\n
That Nana had promised \u201cforever forever,\u201d but apparently forever lasted only until Grandpa got angry?<\/p>\n
No.<\/p>\n
I couldn\u2019t do it.<\/p>\n
But the more I thought about Conrad\u2019s reaction, the less sense it made.<\/p>\n
He had never cared much about tattoos before.<\/p>\n
Our son had one on his ankle. Conrad had teased him when he first got it, but that was all.<\/p>\n
His younger brother had an old tattoo on his shoulder that everyone had seen a hundred times at summer barbecues.<\/p>\n
Conrad had never called either of them trashy.<\/p>\n
So why had mine caused such a violent reaction?<\/p>\n
Eventually, I called his brother, Wesley.<\/p>\n
Wesley and I had always gotten along well, and if anyone could tell Conrad he was behaving like an idiot without causing another war, it was him.<\/p>\n
\u201cI need some marriage advice,\u201d I said when he answered.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat sounds ominous.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt might be.\u201d<\/p>\n
I told him what had happened.<\/p>\n
At first, Wesley listened quietly.<\/p>\n
But when I repeated what Conrad had said about no longer being attracted to me, Wesley went completely silent.<\/p>\n
\u201cWes?\u201d<\/p>\n
He exhaled.<\/p>\n
\u201cLorna, I need to ask you something.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAll right.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHas Maisie said anything strange lately?\u201d<\/p>\n
The question caught me off guard.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaisie?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYes.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAbout what?\u201d<\/p>\n
Another pause.<\/p>\n
Then Wesley muttered, \u201cDamn it.\u201d<\/p>\n
My stomach tightened.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat is going on?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought Conrad was going to tell you himself.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cTell me what?\u201d<\/p>\n
Wesley didn\u2019t answer immediately, and that frightened me more than if he had simply blurted it out.<\/p>\n
Finally, he said, \u201cA few weeks ago, when Conrad took Maisie for ice cream\u2026 they met someone.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat do you mean, someone?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cA woman.\u201d<\/p>\n
I sat straighter.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat woman?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHer name is Celeste.\u201d<\/p>\n
I knew the name.<\/p>\n
Not well, but I knew it.<\/p>\n
Conrad had worked with Celeste many years ago. Recently, he had mentioned that they had run into each other again through old friends.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat about her?\u201d<\/p>\n
Wesley\u2019s voice softened.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaisie saw Conrad kiss her.\u201d<\/p>\n
For several seconds, I couldn\u2019t speak.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m sorry.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cShe\u2019s six. She probably misunderstood.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s what Conrad said too.\u201d<\/p>\n
My hand tightened around the phone.<\/p>\n
\u201cHow do you know about this?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause he called me afterward.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAfterward?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cMaisie apparently asked him why he kissed \u2018the lady with the bird.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
I frowned.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe lady with the bird?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cCeleste has a bird tattoo across one shoulder. Maisie noticed it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Suddenly, I felt cold.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd Conrad knew Maisie had seen them?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYes.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBefore you got your tattoo.\u201d<\/p>\n
I closed my eyes.<\/p>\n
Everything shifted.<\/p>\n
Conrad staring at my arm.<\/p>\n
His face changing.<\/p>\n
The sudden anger.<\/p>\n
Tattoos are trashy.<\/p>\n
You ruined your body.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m not attracted to you anymore.<\/p>\n
Remove it.<\/p>\n
For the first time, I wondered if I had misunderstood what I had seen on his face.<\/p>\n
Maybe it hadn\u2019t been disgust.<\/p>\n
Maybe it had been fear.<\/p>\n
\u201cWesley,\u201d I whispered, \u201chow much do you know?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNot enough to tell you exactly what happened between them. Conrad told me it was one kiss and a mistake. I told him he needed to tell you.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBut he didn\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe picked a fight with me instead.\u201d<\/p>\n
Wesley was quiet.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m sorry, Lorna. I should have told you sooner.\u201d<\/p>\n
I ended the call and sat alone at the kitchen table.<\/p>\n
Then I began remembering things I had ignored.<\/p>\n
The nights Conrad came home later than expected.<\/p>\n
The way he had recently started keeping his phone face down.<\/p>\n
The afternoon I walked into the room and he quickly closed a message.<\/p>\n
None of those things had seemed important by themselves.<\/p>\n
Together, they felt different.<\/p>\n
When Conrad came home that evening, I was waiting.<\/p>\n
He took one look at me and seemed to know something was wrong.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat happened?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWho is Celeste?\u201d<\/p>\n
He froze.<\/p>\n
It lasted less than a second, but after thirty-two years, I knew his face.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat do you mean?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cDoes Celeste have a bird tattoo on her shoulder?\u201d<\/p>\n
The color drained from him.<\/p>\n
\u201cWho told you that?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cDid you kiss her?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cLorna\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cDid you?\u201d<\/p>\n
He looked away.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaisie is six. Children don\u2019t always understand what they see.\u201d<\/p>\n
My heart sank.<\/p>\n
Not because of his answer.<\/p>\n
Because it wasn\u2019t an answer.<\/p>\n
\u201cDid you kiss Celeste?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n
I watched him carefully.<\/p>\n
\u201cThen let me see your phone.\u201d<\/p>\n
His head snapped toward me.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYour phone.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re not going through my messages.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIf nothing happened, why not?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause married people are still entitled to privacy.\u201d<\/p>\n
I laughed softly.<\/p>\n
\u201cI asked whether you kissed another woman, and your biggest concern is privacy?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re twisting this.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThen untwist it. Show me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n
Something inside me became strangely calm.<\/p>\n
\u201cWas there a kiss?\u201d<\/p>\n
He rubbed a hand across his face.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was one time.\u201d<\/p>\n
I stared at him.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou just told me there wasn\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI panicked.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWas it really one kiss?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYes.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cDid she kiss you?\u201d<\/p>\n
He hesitated.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe both got caught up in the moment.\u201d<\/p>\n
My eyes filled, but I refused to look away.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd Maisie saw you.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cShe wasn\u2019t supposed to.\u201d<\/p>\n
That sentence landed badly.<\/p>\n
Not, \u201cI shouldn\u2019t have done it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Not, \u201cI\u2019m ashamed.\u201d<\/p>\n
She wasn\u2019t supposed to see it.<\/p>\n
I looked down at my arm.<\/p>\n
At Maisie\u2019s drawing.<\/p>\n
And suddenly, the last piece fell into place.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou weren\u2019t angry about my tattoo.\u201d<\/p>\n
Conrad frowned.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou were scared of it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat doesn\u2019t even make sense.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt does now.\u201d<\/p>\n
I touched the little picture gently.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaisie remembered Celeste because of the tattoo on her shoulder.\u201d<\/p>\n
His expression shifted.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe calls her the lady with the bird.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cLorna\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd then I came home with a tattoo of my own.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re imagining things.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo. You realized that every time Maisie saw mine, tattoos might become a conversation.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said nothing.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe might mention the bird tattoo.\u201d<\/p>\n
Still nothing.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe might ask why Grandpa kissed the lady with the bird.\u201d<\/p>\n
Conrad looked away.<\/p>\n
That was enough.<\/p>\n
I felt something in my chest collapse.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou told me I was unattractive because you were afraid a six-year-old might expose you.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat isn\u2019t what happened.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThen why didn\u2019t you object when I first mentioned the tattoo?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI wasn\u2019t listening properly.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBut when you actually saw it, suddenly my body was ruined.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI was upset.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou were terrified.\u201d<\/p>\n
He opened his mouth, but I kept going.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou looked at Maisie\u2019s drawing and didn\u2019t see your granddaughter. You saw Celeste.\u201d<\/p>\n
His shoulders dropped.<\/p>\n
I swallowed hard.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd instead of telling me the truth, you made me believe there was something wrong with me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI never wanted to hurt you.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBut you did.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI made a mistake.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo, Conrad. Kissing her may have been a mistake. Everything after that was a choice.\u201d<\/p>\n
He looked at me.<\/p>\n
I continued quietly.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou lied about the kiss. You hid your phone. And when you thought Maisie might say something, you attacked the one thing that made me happy enough to make me consider removing it.\u201d<\/p>\n
His face softened.<\/p>\n
\u201cLorna, please.\u201d<\/p>\n
I shook my head.<\/p>\n
\u201cNot tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n
I slept in the guest room.<\/p>\n
Over the following weeks, Conrad apologized repeatedly.<\/p>\n
He promised there had been no affair.<\/p>\n
He offered to go to counseling.<\/p>\n
He said he would never see Celeste again.<\/p>\n
But every time I asked to see the messages between them, he refused.<\/p>\n
Eventually, I realized I no longer needed to know every detail.<\/p>\n
I already knew enough.<\/p>\n
The hardest part wasn\u2019t even imagining him kissing another woman.<\/p>\n
It was remembering how quickly he had turned his guilt toward me.<\/p>\n
He had watched me doubt my own judgment.<\/p>\n
He had watched me wonder whether my body was suddenly unattractive.<\/p>\n
He had watched me consider removing something precious to me.<\/p>\n
And all the while, he knew the truth.<\/p>\n
A few months later, I filed for divorce.<\/p>\n
It was one of the hardest decisions I had ever made.<\/p>\n
Thirty-two years cannot simply be erased because the ending is painful. There were good memories in our marriage. Birthdays. Vacations. Children. Funerals we survived together. Ordinary Sunday mornings that had once meant everything to me.<\/p>\n
Leaving did not make those years fake.<\/p>\n
It simply meant I could no longer build the next part of my life on a lie.<\/p>\n
Maisie noticed Conrad was no longer living at home, although we tried to keep the adult details far away from her.<\/p>\n
One afternoon, she climbed onto the couch beside me and quietly rested her head against my arm.<\/p>\n
\u201cNana?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYes?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAre you sad?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cA little.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause Grandpa isn\u2019t here?\u201d<\/p>\n
I took a moment before answering.<\/p>\n
\u201cSome things are changing, sweetheart.\u201d<\/p>\n
She frowned.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t like changing.\u201d<\/p>\n
I smiled sadly.<\/p>\n
\u201cNeither do I sometimes.\u201d<\/p>\n
For a while, she said nothing.<\/p>\n
Then she noticed my tattoo.<\/p>\n
Her face brightened immediately.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy picture is still there.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOf course it is.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou didn\u2019t take it off?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n
She leaned closer and examined the crooked letters she had written months earlier.<\/p>\n
Then she looked up at me.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou said forever forever.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI remember.\u201d<\/p>\n
Maisie thought about that for a moment before wrapping both arms around me.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou still have forever forever.\u201d<\/p>\n
My throat tightened.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat do you mean?\u201d<\/p>\n
She squeezed me harder.<\/p>\n
\u201cMe.\u201d<\/p>\n
That was when I cried.<\/p>\n
Not loudly.<\/p>\n
I simply held her while tears ran down my face, and for once I didn\u2019t try to hide them.<\/p>\n
All my life, I had thought having a loving family meant keeping everyone together no matter how difficult things became.<\/p>\n
But maybe that wasn\u2019t what love looked like.<\/p>\n
Maybe sometimes love was knowing which things were worth holding onto and which things were hurting you simply because you were afraid to let go.<\/p>\n
Later that evening, after Maisie had gone home, I caught sight of my arm while washing the dishes.<\/p>\n
The picture was still imperfect.<\/p>\n
The sun was too large.<\/p>\n
Our arms were ridiculous.<\/p>\n
The letters leaned in every direction.<\/p>\n
And I loved every inch of it.<\/p>\n
For a while, I had believed that tattoo had somehow damaged my marriage.<\/p>\n
It hadn\u2019t.<\/p>\n
It had only brought a secret too close to the surface for Conrad to keep hiding comfortably.<\/p>\n
And even after everything that followed, I never once regretted keeping Maisie\u2019s drawing exactly where it was.<\/p>\n
Because when she had asked whether I would keep it \u201cforever forever,\u201d I had made her a promise.<\/p>\n
This time, I intended to keep it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When my six-year-old granddaughter handed me a drawing with \u201cI LOVE YOU NANA\u201d written across the top in big, crooked letters, I nearly cried. It was the kind of picture most people would probably smile at for a moment before sticking it to the refrigerator. The yellow sun took up almost half the page, the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3259,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3258","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"views":48,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3258","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3258"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3258\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3260,"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3258\/revisions\/3260"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3259"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3258"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3258"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3258"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}