The Miner's Girl

Chapter 19

"So?" I asked.

"He understood. Me and him are friends. He gets it. He said that we could go get your check for the past two days whenever. You're welcome."

"Thank you, baby." I smiled.

"So we're all going to Arizona for Thanksgiving."

"Arizona?"

"Yeah, you know I have family there."

"What if I wanted to go back home to North Carolina for Thanksgiving?"

He grunted. "Just go with me to Arizona and we'll go there for Christmas....but not New Year's."

"Okay."

"Hey, guess what, baby." He wrapped his arms around me as I cooked. He gave me a kiss on the neck.

"What?"

"Your birthday is almost here."

"Oh, yeah! I had totally forgotten about my birthday. What's today?"

"The 23rd. That means you have...." He looked up to think. "Twenty-two more days until December 15th."

"I'll be twenty years old."

"Yup, my baby is growing up." He chuckled. "Where you wanna go for your birthday?"

"I don't know. I'll think about it."

"Maybe, um, somewhere like a beach somewhere or a mountain vacation."

"The mountains sound fun. You spoil me too much, Parker."

"I like spoiling my baby." Then he whispered in my ear from behind, "I like where it gets me, too."

"Oh, shut up."

He just smiled as he grabbed a piece of bacon from the plate to eat.

"So we're going to Arizona tomorrow."

"Sounds good. Get some plates from the bar. The food's done."

He grabbed two foam plates from the bar and gave one to me before piling food on his plate. He sure does eat a lot for a guy that's as skinny as he is. We sat down at the bar and ate. He told me about his trip to D.C., and I told him about my visit to the grandparent's. He said that we would go to their house when we got back from California.

"So what are we going to do today?"

"I don't know. It's kinda cold. Too bad it's not snowing."

"Ugh, I know. I wish it was."

"Maybe we should just stay in."

"Hey! Let's look through the photo albums!"

"Where they at?"

"In my room in my closet in a box."

"Go get them. I'm going to put a movie in."

"Okay, sounds good." I smiled.

I walked down the hall into my room. Before I looked in the closet, I changed back into more comfortable clothes. I opened my closet and started looking for the photo album box among all the other ones that I hadn't unpacked yet. The box had at least five big photo albums, each that I had organized and put together from youngest to oldest. It was a good thing that I had labeled the boxes, and I found the box within a few minutes. I picked it up and carried it into the living room where Parker was sitting on the floor in front of the television, looking through movies.

"Hey, I found the box." I said as I plopped down beside him.

"Cool. Hey, wanna watch some John Wayne?"

I chuckled, "Sure, baby."

He put in a movie, and I opened the box. Along with the photo albums, there was also my school pictures, graduation stuff, and other random things that I wanted to keep.
I pulled out the first album, the one that is from when we were little. Parker started looking at the things in the box, too.

"This your graduation stuff?" He said as he picked up the packet.

"Yup. Pictures from the school year, school pictures, diploma, graduation pictures from the ceremony and the party, and my tassel."

He opened it and started looking through it. He started smiling at the pictures.

"Who's all these people?" He asked, handing me a picture that we had gotten the teacher to take of us on the last official day of school.

I started from the left and went right, telling him who they all were. "That's Sam, Dean, me, Peter, and Sarah." I went to a private school, and there wasn't many people there.

"You look happy."

"Yeah, it was the last day of school, and we were graduating together. They were my best friends."

"So which one was your boyfriend?" He nudged me and smiled.

"Well, me and Dean had a thing for a while, but we broke up like, four months before that picture."

"You sure were mighty close to him."

"He pulled me over. And I hadn't even talked to him since, well, not since I came here. And I'm sure when I look through your pictures at your house, I'll find a hundred of you with different girls."

"Maybe."

"That's what I thought....hey, look how cute I was when I was a baby."

"Aw, you're so cute. That's your grandpa, isn't it?"

"Yeah. My Pa. And here's one with my mom."

"In the snow."

"Yeah." I sniffed, feeling the tear in my eye.

"Then with your dad." He said as he flipped the page over.

I smiled, "Yeah." I felt a tear going down my face.

Parker looked at me and saw that I was crying. "What's wrong, baby?"

"I just miss them. I don't cry like I feel like I should. When my Papa died, my mom cried for months. It took me a couple of days to stop crying. I don't know, I feel like I'm a bad daughter or something. I don't think that they would be happy with me."

"Just because you don't cry every minute of every day doesn't mean that you don't miss them and love them. It means you have enough support and love to help you through it. If you want to cry, baby, you can cry all you want, and I'll be here for you, because you're my baby girl."

I really bursted out crying then. I buried my face in his shirt and put my arms around him. I cried. I cried not only because of my parents, but also because I didn't think that I deserved what I have. I have a great boyfriend that supports me, and I get to travel with him. I have his parents and grandparents as a support system, along with my family and friends. I have a house, food, and clothes. I get to live in my favorite place in the world. I'm so blessed, even though I know that I don't deserve it.

"I don't deserve you!" I bawled to him.

"What are you talking about, baby?

"You're so great, and I'm a wreck. I don't deserve a guy like you, one that is a good man, and supports me, and works, and treats me good."

"You're the greatest girl ever. If anything, I don't deserve you. You do deserve a good guy." He kissed my head.