The biker held his daughter tightly.<\/p>\n
Neither of them wanted to let go.<\/p>\n
Tears soaked his vest.<\/p>\n
The bakery around them faded away.<\/p>\n
Nothing mattered except the little girl in his arms.<\/p>\n
Then\u2014<\/p>\n
something caught his eye.<\/p>\n
A silver necklace hanging around her neck.<\/p>\n
Small.<\/p>\n
Worn.<\/p>\n
Old.<\/p>\n
The biker froze.<\/p>\n
Slowly, he reached toward it.<\/p>\n
His hand trembling.<\/p>\n
\u201cSweetheart…\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhere did you get this?\u201d<\/p>\n
The little girl looked down.<\/p>\n
Then carefully held the necklace in her hand.<\/p>\n
\u201cMom gave it to me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cShe said never take it off.\u201d<\/p>\n
The biker’s breathing became uneven.<\/p>\n
Because he recognized it immediately.<\/p>\n
Twenty years ago\u2014<\/p>\n
he had given that necklace to the woman he loved.<\/p>\n
The little girl opened the locket.<\/p>\n
Inside was a tiny photograph.<\/p>\n
Faded with age.<\/p>\n
A picture of a young biker smiling beside a pregnant woman.<\/p>\n
The biker covered his mouth.<\/p>\n
A sob escaping before he could stop it.<\/p>\n
The little girl looked at him nervously.<\/p>\n
\u201cMom used to look at it every night.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cShe said you were a good man.\u201d<\/p>\n
More tears filled the biker’s eyes.<\/p>\n
Years of guilt.<\/p>\n
Years of wondering.<\/p>\n
Years of believing he had been forgotten.<\/p>\n
Gone in an instant.<\/p>\n
Then\u2014<\/p>\n
the little girl reached into her backpack.<\/p>\n
Pulling out one final envelope.<\/p>\n
\u201cI almost forgot.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cShe wanted you to have this too.\u201d<\/p>\n
The biker opened it carefully.<\/p>\n
Inside was a letter.<\/p>\n
Just one sentence written across the page.<\/p>\n
I never told her you were gone. I told her you were lost.<\/strong><\/p>\n The biker’s knees nearly gave out.<\/p>\n Because for all those years\u2014<\/p>\n the woman had never stopped believing he’d come home.<\/p>\n And now\u2014<\/p>\n through their daughter\u2014<\/p>\n he finally had.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The biker held his daughter tightly. Neither of them wanted to let go. Tears soaked his vest. The bakery around them faded away. Nothing mattered except the little girl in his arms. Then\u2014 something caught his eye. A silver necklace hanging around her neck. Small. Worn. Old. The biker froze. Slowly, he reached toward it. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":7643,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7641","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-trending-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7641","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7641"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7641\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7643"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}