Loves Second Chance

Chapter Six

Parker parked his truck in the tiny graveyard. The sky was already darkening but he didn't need light to know where the graves were he was looking for. As luck or irony would have it, his mother and Emily's parents who had hated each other in life, were buried right next to each other in death.

He walked over to the graves and stared down at all three of them in turn.

"Hi mom. Hi Mr. and Mrs. Thompson. How are you all doing today? Still dead I see." Parker said matter-of-factly. He kicked at a frozen rock with his greasy work boot and rubbed his hands over his face.

"I hope you all are happy now." he said his voice becoming more angry. "Are you finally fucking satisfied now that you see what you took from me and Emily?

"Mr. and Mrs. Thompson, you all never believed I was good enough for Em. Truth be told I'm not. Barely graduated high school and I'm still working in that garage.. But you know what? I love that woman more than anybody has ever loved another person. Doesn't that count for something?" Parker wished that they could answer, but of course they couldn't.

"If the three of you could have just accepted Emily and I.. If you could have accepted the fact that I loved her and she loved me then we wouldn't have been on that back road that day racing off to get married at that preachers house. If the three of you could have pulled your heads out of your asses for five minutes, I might not have lost my son." Parker knew he was starting to yell but he didn't care. There weren't any houses around.

"Did it make you happy, Mr. Thompson, that Emily did leave me? Did it make you happy that her and I were fighting? Because of losing our son we fell apart…..

"Did you roll over in your grave every damn time that man hit her? Every time he beat her? When he broke her ribs or shattered her arm did you think to yourselves that maybe I hadn't been such a bad man for her?" Parker couldn't stop himself from kicking at the ground of Randall Thompson's grave.

"Nothing about what her and I went through was fair, dammit!" Parker shouted at none of them in particular. "But I'm going to tell all three of you something right now. I am going to make this work with her this time.I am going to keep her safe from John and if she'll have me, I have every intention of marrying that woman like I should have six years ago.

"And this time there isn't a damn thing the three of you can do about it." Parker turned quickly and walked straight back to his truck. He had one more stop he wanted to make before he went home.

Parker hadn't been down this back road in six years. He had always driven miles out of his way instead of coming through here and having to pass by the place where he had lost not only his son but Emily as well. The two of them had never gotten over what had happened in this spot.

Parker stood looking at the cliff that he had crashed into that day. He wanted to see some kind of mark on the stone. Some kind of evidence of what had occurred here but there was nothing. Parker sat down on a rock and looked up at the dark night sky.

"Hey, my little man. It's your daddy." he said hearing his voice crack. "Sorry it took me so long to get here. I was lost for a while." Parker listened to the wind as it howled across the mountains.

"You'd be in first grade now. Might even be playing little league or pee wee football. Your daddy played football. I was pretty darn good at it too. Your mommy hated it. Always had to drag her to the games and she would act like she was bored and sit there with her book.. But whenever I made a good catch or scored a touchdown I would look up at her and she'd be watching me and she'd be cheering." Parker was too caught up in his own thoughts and emotions to hear the sheriffs car pull up behind his truck.