Starting Over

Chapter 93- Bad News

It's been a couple of weeks since the spring break shows and everything has been going great. Bridget and I have been able to spend most of the time together. Today we got to sit at home all day and spend some quality time together with the twins while the rest of the kids were at school. Now we are going through some old photos of me for the Country Music Hall of Fame. Til and Kenzie are getting a kick out of some of the pictures in the old photo album Bridget got from Momma. We have been laughing and giggling all afternoon. I got up to go check on supper that Bridget had in the oven when I heard her phone ring.

"Hey Daddy!" Bridget said cheerfully as she answered the phone. I stepped back closing the oven when my heart shattered, "NO! NO!"

I ran back to the living room to see Bridget on her knees in the middle of the living room floor. A photo album randomly opened in front of her from where she had just dropped it. There were tears streaming down her face and she could barely breathe. I rushed over to her side trying to help her up off the floor, but she didn't budge. I knelt down beside her as she still held the phone to her ear, motionless.

"What happened?" I asked, my voice full of concern, "What's wrong?"

"No! No!" Bridget continued to whimper as the tears continued to stream down her face.

"Baby, what's wrong?" I questioned her again.

"Granddad. Granddad died. He's gone. I just saw him and now he's gone," Bridget choked out among the sobs.

"I'm so sorry," I said pulling my wife into my arms loving her only the way that I could.

We sat there in the middle of the living room floor for a while as Bridget sobbed with her head on my shoulder. We had just saw him last week when we went up to get some things together at the lake house. He was perfectly healthy. Or so we thought. I know this was going to change everything. I knew in that moment we would be driving to Kentucky in the middle of the night. There was no way Bridget would want to be here when she could be there with all of her family.

Bridget was the oldest of the four kids. All girls obviously. Her biological momma had died when she was just a small child and her dad, Kurtis, had remarried when she was six. Bridget's stepmom was the oldest of nine, so there that side of her family was really large. They lived all over from her hometown to Lexington to Georgia to Tennessee. At this moment they were all dropping what they were doing and heading home. I knew that Bridget would be no different.

"Why don't we go get some stuff together and we'll go?" I suggested to my wife.

Bridget didn't say one word. She just allowed me to help her off the floor and we started upstairs to pack our suitcases. I didn't let her go. My arm remained around her waist until we entered our bedroom door. She immediately broke my hold and went straight into our closet to grab our suitcases. I watched as she sat them on the bed not wasting any time and started packing. I went into the closet and grabbed a few pairs of jeans, some shirts, and a couple of hoodies taking them and laying them across the bed.

"What kind of suit should I pack?" I asked Bridget as she was pulling socks and boxers out of my dresser.

"It really don't matter I guess. Just a suit," Bridget said quietly.

Her sobs had stopped briefly, but I knew it was only because she was focusing on something else. I watched as Bridget grabbed her royal blue pant suit and a more traditional black one. I grabbed my two favorite suits. I say favorite, but honestly they were the most comfortable. As soon as I laid them out on the bed I went to grab a couple of ties. I stood there staring at them, not knowing which ones to grab.

"The blue and the marron one right there," Bridget mustered as she passed behind me pointing at the ties she was talking about.

"These?" I asked holding up the two ties as I walked out of our closet.