I raised Ashley alone from the age of two.
Her mother, Melissa, left because she wasn’t ready to be a parent. Those were her words.
I was 28, working two jobs, and barely covering rent.
For years, it was just us.
Those were her words.
I learned to braid hair from a library book because Ashley refused to go to school with “dad ponytails.”
I burned pancakes, bought secondhand coats, and read bedtime stories after double shifts.
We didn’t have much.
But my daughter could make a cardboard box feel like Christmas.
We didn’t have much.
When Ashley was six, she woke me on Father’s Day, holding something behind her back.
“Close your eyes, Daddy!”
After wearing a shirt, I did.
“Now open them!”
She held up a tie cut from blue construction paper.
It was crooked, covered in red hearts, with “BEST DAD EVER” written in purple crayon!
