On the way home

Mother said yes!

We have stopped off in Egypt, but we will only be staying for one day. That is fine though, I just want to come here to meet my father. So I will have plenty of time to do that. *

On my way out, I ran into a bunch of butterflies, they were so pretty. One of them landed right on my finger and brushed my cheek with its wings. It tickled, and made me smile.

I am so happy to finally meet my father. Mother has not told me much about him in the past, she said she just did not want to talk about it. Before I left I asked her what I should expect, and she said "Let it be a surprise, I want you to learn about him on your own." She did tell me that he worked in the market, and I would probably find him there. So off I go.

*

So I would be able to find him, Mother described to me what my father looked like, and that his name was Ameen. It only took a few minutes for me to locate him, and I introduced my self. At first I did not tell him that I was his daughter, and just tried to get to know him as a person, no influence. We talked well into the afternoon, he taught me a song "Under the Hot Desert Sun", and he also told me a few stories. One story that he told me involved a beautiful woman that came to him in a dream, and he fell in love with her. With the way he told that story, I realized that he was talking of my mother.

I figured this was as good of an opening as ever to tell him the truth.

Maybe I was wrong.

As I was talking, his attitude slowly changed as he listened to me. When I got to the part of me being a creation of their love, his demeanor totally changed and he got pretty upset. He told me he was never advised of my birth, and he was happy he was never told. He never wanted children and doesn't know how to handle this. Ameen said he had to go back to work and promptly stormed off back to his register.

I was pretty taken aback by his reaction, and although I did not cry, I was thoroughly upset. I ran back to camp to tell my mother everything that happened, and all he had said. She took me in her arms and held me for the rest of the night. It seems like for some reason she knew this would happen. *

I had the worst night sleep ever that night, and was thankful we were leaving in the morning, I did not want to stay.

The plane is leaving at 6 am. Mother and I got up at 4:30 so we would have plenty of time to take showers and eat before our flight. Our trip back home was pretty quiet, and seemed like it took forever.