The girl looked down.
“We missed it.”
He frowned.
“You were going?”
She nodded.
“Mommy said maybe we shouldn’t.”
“Why?”
The girl shrugged.
“Because Grandpa’s friends didn’t know us.”
The female rider looked at the president.
He asked carefully:
“Why didn’t we know you?”
The girl picked at the blanket.
“Grandpa said it was complicated.”
That sounded exactly like the old man.
“He said grown-up things can be complicated even when love isn’t.”
The female rider turned away.
The chapter president stared at the floor.
“Did you see him often?”
“Grandpa?”
“Yes.”
The girl nodded.
“Sometimes.”
“How often?”
“He came on Sundays when he wasn’t sick.”
“Where?”
“Our apartment.”
The chapter president thought back.
For years, Sunday mornings belonged to club breakfast.
Then about five years ago, the old biker stopped staying after breakfast.
He always left around eleven.
When asked, he said errands.
They mocked him.
Secret girlfriend.
Church.
Illegal bingo operation.
Anything except the truth.
He had been visiting his daughter and granddaughter.
The female rider asked:
“How long?”
The girl counted silently.
“Since I was little.”
“You remember?”
“Not first.”
“Mom has pictures.”
The chapter president felt anger.
Not at the girl.
At his dead friend.
How could he hide this?
How could a man who called them family keep an entire daughter hidden?
Then immediately came guilt.
The old biker was dead.
Anger had nowhere useful to go.
The hospital waiting room clock reached 1:26.
A doctor finally appeared.
The mother had suffered a serious blood-sugar emergency combined with dehydration and exhaustion.
She had been dangerously unresponsive but responded to treatment.
The doctors wanted to keep her overnight for monitoring and additional tests.
She was awake.
Stable.
The little girl started crying before the doctor finished.
The chapter president closed his eyes.
Relief moved through him like weakness.
The doctor looked at the riders.
“Family?”
The chapter president hesitated.
The little girl answered:
“Yes.”
Everyone turned toward her.
She pulled the blanket closer.
“They’re Grandpa’s family.”
The doctor nodded as though that settled it.
Maybe it did.
The mother asked to speak with the chapter president alone.
He entered her hospital room at 2:03.
She looked exhausted.
An IV ran into one arm.
Her brown hair lay messy against the pillow.
She studied him for several seconds.
“You’re the president.”
He nodded.
“How’d you know?”
“My father had photographs.”
The words my father changed the air.
He sat in the chair near the wall rather than beside her bed.
“He never told us.”