Police Protection Program

Chapter 17

“I won’t tell him, I promise. I just want to know more about him. S-so that I can help him… like you said.”

Richard remained silent for a minutes. He sighed before launching into his tale. “Jett and his mother were incredibly, incredibly close. He is our only child.

I met Agatha when I was 17 years old, she was 15. She grew up an only child. All she would ever talk about was how badly she wanted to start a family. She wanted at least seven kids.” He chuckled lightly to himself. “And she wanted to start her family right then, at 15. Now I of course didn’t want children at all, especially not at such a young age.

We got married when she turned 18, and she was determined to begin her family.

He twisted the wedding band around his finger. “I loved her so much, and I wanted to give her what she wanted so badly. But I just didn’t feel that either of us were ready for children.

This of course led to endless fighting. We were damn near ready to divorce… until I finally gave into her wishes.”

“So how did you only end up with one kid?” I asked.

“Well we got to work with making babies that’s for sure. Agatha got pregnant numerous times, at least five. But each time… “ he shook his head, “she miscarried.”

“The doctor didn’t know exactly what the problem was with her, just that we were an unlucky couple.”

“We stopped trying. Agatha went into a sort of… depression. She would eat very little, she didn’t talk much. She lost weight, her face became sunken in and tired looking. At only 25, people thought she was my mother.

I tried everything I could to cheer her up. But I knew that only a baby would do the trick.

I considered adopting, maybe even getting a surrogate.

Until we took a trip to Ireland for her birthday. The saints there must have felt bad for us and decided to gift us… with a baby.

We came back to the states and nine months later Jett was born.

The change in Agatha was blatantly obvious. She gained her weight back, the color came back to her skin, the tiredness and wrinkles seemed to disappear, and joy was in her eyes again.”

Richard smiled to himself. “I had never seen her happier than when she looked at him. And he looked back at her with the same adoring affection.

We decided together that we didn’t need any other children. The three of us were happy.”

“That’s beautiful.” I smiled, feeling the same joy in my heart that they must have felt then.

“But…” the smile slowly disappeared from Richard’s face, “she died a year ago.”

I felt my face fall also. Oh no, oh no, oh no. She died because, I killed her. I tried hard not to let my thoughts reflect on my face.