Scott Wittenburg - See Tom Run

Erin outstretched her hands and chuckled. “What cops? Haven’t exactly seen too many of them around lately.”

Tom laughed. “Good point.”

“So what are we going to do with him?” the girl asked.

Tom stared at the unconscious man and said, “Tie him up, I guess. I wonder if Kyle left me any duct tape.”

“Looks like there’s still some left,” Erin said, pointing at the roll still lying on the kitchen counter.

“Why don’t you go ahead and take that hot shower while I tie him up?” Tom suggested.

“Yes!” Erin smiled broadly. “I’ll go out and get my things.”

Erin left and Tom lit up a couple more candles, grabbed the duct tape and bound Donnie Shortridge securely to the chair. He heard Erin come back in the front door and make her way upstairs to the bathroom. When he was finished with Donnie, he went to the living room fireplace, lit a match, valved in the gas and watched as the gas logs came to life. With a long yawn, he sat down on the sofa and leaned his head back.

He heard the faucet squeak and the water running upstairs as Erin started her shower. He thought of how grateful he was that the girl had the courage and moxie to do what she had just done. Most girls her age probably would never have taken the risk to come to his aid as she had. The more he got to know Erin Myers, the more he realized what a truly unique individual she was.

His thoughts shifted to Donnie Shortridge and what had just occurred. A number of questions came to mind as he fought the fatigue gnawing away at him.

For starters, why had Donnie shown up in the first place-and why now of all times, when there were only a few people still existing on earth as far as he knew? Why someone from his hometown-someone he had never known before yet someone who apparently knew plenty about him?

And how much of this man’s insane story should he believe? Yes, he had had a one-night stand with Mindy Conkel twenty years ago. And yes, it was possible but unlikely that he had gotten her pregnant. But why had Donnie been so adamant that Tom had been the father of her child?

And what about Mindy Conkel, who had at first insisted that Donnie was the father then recanted once it was discovered that Donnie’s DNA didn’t match the child’s? Why would she all of a sudden insist it was Tom instead? How could she be so certain?

Unless, Tom thought, he had actually been the only one who had slept with Mindy that particular month. There was an outside possibility, and if it were the case, then she would have been correct in assuming that Tom was the father.

Tom swallowed hard and stared intently into the fire. What if he really had been the father of Mindy Conkel’s child? What if the call she had made to him in New York had been a legitimate cry for him to take some kind of responsibility for her desperate situation?

His thoughts flew into a tailspin. He had been so much in denial of the situation at the time that he had totally dismissed its seriousness. And this denial was ultimately what had kept him from accepting responsibility when he should have.

How convenient, he thought.

And the fact that Mindy had called him once and only once had made it even easier for him to forsake his responsibility.

Tom leaned back on the sofa. He was so exhausted now that he could barely keep his eyes open. He yawned and promptly drifted off to sleep

…

“Tom?” he heard Erin say softly.

He opened his eyes and saw her sitting beside him on the sofa, her expression apologetic.

“I hate to wake you up but I wasn’t sure if you wanted me to or not. You had mentioned wanting to take a shower.”

Tom sat up straight. “Oh, yeah, I’m glad you woke me up. I guess I just dozed off for a moment there.”

He rubbed his eyes and noticed that Erin was wearing nothing but a white oversized tee shirt that went down to just above her knees and that she smelled as sweet as a rose after her shower. Her hair was still damp, combed out poker straight, falling onto her shoulders in shiny strands. For the first time, Tom realized that Erin Myers was attractive in an oddly compelling way that made her unique-as unique on the outside as she was on the inside.

“How long have you been sitting here?” he asked.

She giggled. “Would you believe about five minutes? You were really dead to the world-and you were snoring, too!”

Tom smiled. “Yeah, that doesn’t surprise me. I feel like I could sleep for a week.”

“You’ll feel much better after a shower-I sure did. But I wouldn’t have any trouble falling asleep now, either.”

“Why don’t you go to sleep, then-I’ll take my shower and do the same.”

“Okay.”

Tom stood up. “Are there enough blankets for you?”

“Yes, I’ll be fine,” Erin replied.

Tom decided to go into the kitchen long enough to check on Donnie Shortridge, who was still out cold, then returned to the living room and headed for the staircase.

“Tom? Who is Mindy?” Erin asked suddenly.

Tom halted in his tracks. He turned toward her and replied, “You mean the Mindy we were discussing in the kitchen? She was Donnie’s wife. Why do you ask?”

“Oh, I don’t know, I just love that name-Mindy. It was my biological mother’s name, too.”

“Oh, really?” Tom said, intrigued at this revelation. “You mean you actually know who your real mom is?”

“Not exactly. All I know is that her name was Mindy. I’ve got a picture of her holding me when I was a baby. I’ve had it for as long as I can remember. You want to see it?”

“Of course I would.”

Erin opened her backpack. Tom sat down beside her and waited as she located her billfold and began thumbing through it.

“Here it is,” she said, taking one of the photos out of a transparent sleeve. She flipped it over and showed Tom the back, which had writing in blue ballpoint pen. It read, “To my lovely daughter. Please know that I will always love you.” At the bottom it was signed, “Mindy, your mommy.”

“See, she even signed it,” Erin said proudly.

She flipped the photo over. “There we are-my mommy and me.”Tom stared at the photo. It was in color and showed a young woman about twenty or so holding a tiny baby in her arms The woman was Mindy Conkel!

Tom looked closer. No doubt about it, the woman in the picture was Mindy.

He was dumbfounded. Not sure what to do or say, Tom struggled for the best way to deal with this.

“She’s very pretty. How in the world did you get this picture, anyway?”

Erin continued holding on to the picture lovingly. “I think my first foster parents gave it to children’s services who in turn gave it to me after I’d been adopted by my second foster family. Since I had already been told that I was an orphan I guess they figured I may as well have it.”

“Did you ever want to find her-your biological mother?” Tom asked curiously.

“Of course! But I haven’t known where to begin. I heard that you could trace your family tree online so I tried that once, but had no luck. It really helps when you have a last name to start with,” she added dismally.

“I wonder if you could post that picture on the internet. There’s a chance that someone might know who she is,” Tom suggested, feeling more and more guilty the further he went with this charade.

“I tried that, too. In fact, Kyle put it online for me, which is about the only nice thing he’d ever done for me. We never heard back from anyone. It’s useless. I’ll probably never know who she is-or was.”

Tom wanted nothing more than tell her who her mother was. And that he knew who her father was, too. That it just so happened that her dad was the same man sitting there with her right now.