Free Broken Promises by Terri Reid

of you. Why are you doing this? I can’t be dead. I need to take care of Becca and Clarissa. They need me. I promised them.”
    His voice cracked and he fell to his knees. Dropping his head in his hands, he cried, “I can’t be dead. Who is going to help them?”
    Bradley, making sure he had Mary’s hand securely in his own, knelt down next to him. “We will, Henry,” he promised. “We’ll find them and we’ll help them. But we are going to need you to help us.”
    Henry looked up and met Bradley’s eyes. “You don’t understand,” he whispered, grief evident in his voice. “Becca doesn’t have much time. But she didn’t know… I made the doctor promise not to tell her. She was so worried about not being there for us, I didn’t want her last months to be focused on the end.”
    “How long did the doctor think she had?” Ian asked.
    Henry shook his head, his eyes filled with grief. “A year, maybe two,” he replied and as he watched their reaction he asked,” Why?”
    “It’s March, Henry,” Mary said. “You’ve been dead for nearly a year.”
    His eyes widened and he shook his head. “You have to find my little girl.”
    He floated to the middle of the room. “Clarissa,” he called out. “Where are you?”
    Then he faded away.

Chapter Twelve
    “Do you want me to walk you up to Mrs. Gunderson’s apartment, dear?” Becca asked Clarissa as she closed their apartment door.
    Clarissa shook her head. Not only did she not want her mother to have to climb the extra stairs, she certainly didn’t want her mother to see the kind of apartment Mrs. Gunderson lived in. If she did, she would be worried all the time, and her mother did not need another thing to worry about.
    “I’m fine, Mommy,” she replied. “I love walking up the stairs by myself.”
    Becca bent over and kissed Clarissa’s forehead. “Do you have your key?” she asked.
    Clarissa pulled the chain from under her shirt and showed her mother the key.
    “You let Mrs. Gunderson use that when she brings you downstairs and tucks you in,” her mother reminded her. “You understand.”
    Clarissa nodded obediently, knowing that Mrs. Gunderson generally kicked her out of the apartment at about 7:00, two hours before she was supposed to, because her shows were on television and she didn’t want to be disturbed. Clarissa generally spent the last several hours alone in their apartment, sitting in the darkened room, so no one would know she was there.
    “I will, Mommy,” she said. “I promise.”
    Becca looked up the stairs, guilt and anguish filling her heart. She didn’t want to leave Clarissa alone with anyone, but she had to go to work. They needed her income.
    “Okay, darling, I won’t be late and I’ll try to bring some dessert home this time.”
    “Thanks, Mommy, I love you.”
    “I love you too, sweetheart.”
    Clarissa stepped up one step and turned and watched her mother slowly struggle down the steps to finally let herself out the front door into the cold afternoon. Sighing, Clarissa turned and walked up the stairs to the fourth floor and Mrs. Gunderson.
    The stairwell was dark and it smelled bad. Clarissa tried to avoid touching the railing because it was often sticky and once, when she had been holding on to it, something crawled over her hand. The walls were stained and littered with graffiti, words that Clarissa’s mother had told her were not nice. And very often the stairs were covered with garbage from the apartments above them.
    Clarissa kicked a beer bottle out of the way and heard it clatter all the way down the stairs behind her. When she reached the fourth floor, she walked to the fifth apartment down the hall.
    Her stomach clenched as she heard the yelling coming from within the apartment. Mrs. Gunderson’s husband was home, because it was Sunday. She sighed, and then, with reluctance, knocked on the door.
    “Who the hell is knocking on the damn door?” she heard Mr. Gunderson yell.
    “Probably that