Learning to Live

Chapter 24

"Why are we here?" Shana said as we got out of the car and stand in front of the All Pines Retirement home.

"I told you, I wanted to see if Mr. Walker was still here."

"But you said yesterday you were not going to bother with this anymore. You wanted to leave well enough alone. Come on hun we have a long drive ahead of us. I want to get back to the city before the traffic builds up."

"Come on, it won't take that long. I promise. "I said holding her hand.

"Okay. I get why you wanted to see him but why is it so important to you? You haven't done anything."

We started walking slowly towards the entrance, holding hands. "Oh yeah, I never really told you why I think that I'm the reason he got evicted. When I was a teen, I was so in love with this girl, Abby. So stupid teenage me thought that the way to a girl's heart is through gifts. I stole six hundred bucks from Mr. Walker to buy her something extravagant."

"Did you buy her something nice?"

"No, I never got the chance. Turns out I started talking to her and she liked me for me and not for the gifts. I came back sometime after to return the money and he was gone. The money I stole was his rent. I never told anyone until now." I was surprised; Shana didn't say a word about what I just told her. I didn't know if she was angry or disappointed. We enter the building and before our eyes, there were a handful of elderly people in the room. Some were playing cards or board games, while the others watched television.

We approach a lady standing by the front desk, she was engaging in conversation with another woman who was working at the front desk. She's a middle-aged woman wearing a nurse's uniform and pink cardigan.

"Excuse us," I said.

"Yes?"

"Hi I'm Ian Somers and this is my girlfriend Shana Dante, we're looking for a Mr. Walker. Unfortunately, I don't know his first name."

"Well I'm sorry, we have about four Mr. Walkers here."

"Please? I know he's living here. He's an African American man with big framed glasses and he's got a gold tooth. Please, when I was younger I did something really stupid and I really need to apologize to him."

She had a slightly shocked look on her face. "Okay. Follow me." We followed her to a small back office, where the shelves are so close to the seats. She closes the door behind us. She opens her purse and pulls out a wallet-sized photo.

"Is this him?" She asks giving me the picture. "Is this the Mr. Walker you're looking for?"

"Yes, that's him."

She smiles, "I'm Anita Thomas, his daughter."

My mouth dropped open, "Wow, no way. Really?"

"His name was Nigel Walker. He died about six years ago of a heart attack."

"I'm sorry...but I thought he didn't have any children."

"Well he didn't either. See, I never knew my biological parents. I was adopted. All I had of them was a locket with their pictures inside. One day I was transferred here and he saw my necklace, and then we knew. Well of course I took a paternity test to confirm. My biological parents were very young when they had me and their relationship wasn't accepted back then because she was white and he was black. My biological mother had me in secret, so he didn't know about me. My grandparents put me up for adoption. Luckily, I was adopted by two lovely people the Thomas'. They were Canadian, so I grew up in Canada."

"That's really nice but I regret not doing this earlier. Maybe I would have gotten a chance to apologize to him."

"May I ask, apologize for what?"