Then came August 18th.
The day I had to tell my children that their father was dead.
There are sentences a mother should never have to say.
That was one of them.
I watched my son’s face as he tried to understand.
I watched my daughter ask questions that broke my heart.
“When can I see Daddy?”
“What do you mean he’s not coming back?”
“I want my dad.”
What do you say to a child when there is no answer that can make sense?
You can’t fix it.
You can’t bring their father back.
You can’t give them a date when they’ll see him again.
You can only hold them while their entire world collapses.
And the hardest part is that they weren’t only grieving their father.
They were grieving Nikki too.
She had become part of their lives.
They knew her.
They loved her.
They had memories with her.
They cared about the children she loved.
So while strangers online saw two names connected to a horrific tragedy, my children saw two people they had loved.
Five children were suddenly left without parents.
Five children had to wake up in a world that looked completely different from the one they knew before August 17th.
