the prison gaurds daughter

epilogue

I was running through a field on my birthday. Benny stood near the picnic table. I was 15 years old and everyone else had forgotten. When I finally reached the table Benny opened a picnic basket and pulled out a small, slightly man-handled cake with my name sloppily written on top. I laughed and asked him if he had written it with his left hand. He smiled and said if he had then it would be entirely unreadable. I tried to cut myself a slice with a flimsy plastic fork. That didn't work out so well. I ended up with a jaggedly cut peice that was only vaguely triangular. Benny laughed and told me never to become a surgeon or the patients would riot. We talked and laughed while we ate the cake. After we finished, he fished around in his pocket for a minute and pulled out a small package wrapped in newspaper. I raised my eyebrows and asked if it was a Ferrari.   He laughed and told me to just open it. I did and found a beautiful silver charm on a leather cord. He told me that it was a celtic good luck charm. I hugged him and put it around my neck. I didnt know it yet but I would wear this necklace for the rest of my life. I didn't know it yet but my dad would try time and time again to get me to wear something else when we went to weddings and such but I always refused. I would tell him that I loved this necklace so much and I wanted to be buried in it. And as it turns out I was. But I didn't know any of that yet. This was my best memory. My family was financially crippled from my moms gambling problem a few years ago and we were in serious debt and in danger of losing our house. But right now that didnt matter. It was my 15th birthday and no one else had remembered except my parents, but that didn't matter either. It was just Benny. Two years later, he would find the courage to tell me that he had liked me since before that day and I would kiss him. I would kiss him because I liked him to. Ever since that important moment when he gave me that important necklace, I had liked him to.