A Short Story About Love

A SHORT STORY ABOUT LOVEBY FRANK DALEY

When our two daughters were young, they came to us one day with the THE question.

“Who do you love more, Elizabeth or me?” said Grace.I replied, “We love you equally. Not exactly the same, but equally.They looked at me as if I was from Mars.

They figured the question was simple and direct and required a simple, direct, and truthful response.

Grace assumed the typical “what?” physical response: head shake, hands out to the side and uplifted slightly, in a plea that said, “What”?

I continued, a little concerned.

“We can’t and don’t love you “the same” because you are individuals with different personalities and different ways of interacting with life, but we love you equally.

They are both keen observers of life and they were not happy with that they were hearing. They pressed for a better answer. “You’re not answering the question.,” said Grace.

My wife tried.

“Not the same exactly, but as much,” she said. “We do not love one of you more than the other.”

They didn’t buy it.

Grace, who was eight, and later became a writer, rolled her green eyes in exasperation. Elizabeth, who was five, and later became an artist, and an art teacher, frowned and narrowed her green eyes. Was this green-eyed jealousy?

Or, “Hell hath no fury like a second child scorned?

They are both keen observers of life and they were not happy with that they were hearing. They pressed for a better answer.

“OK, I said, “Who do you love more, mommy or daddy?”They stopped glaring and stared at me and then my wife, who was smiling.Then they looked at each other and then back to us.“Ok,” Grace said. “We get it.”They then turned around and went off to play.The question, the whole issue, never arose again.

FREE! CURSE OF THE OTTAWA

A story of revenge into ten generations. There’s no such thing as a curse, now, right? Right. Except ten people are dead.