Evelyn sat on the swing while she patched yet another hole in her eldest son's dungarees. She didn't know what he was doing to wear them out and she shook her head as she looked up and watched Sarah and Joseph with their father. Neither of her two younger children had taken to flying like Danny had and she realized they were her children in that respect.
It had become a tradition that Rafe would take her up and fly over Shelby on their anniversary. It would be at the very hour that they were married and it always amazed Evelyn that he remembered that detail. But that was the only time that she would go up with him because Rafe had a passion to fly that Evelyn couldn't comprehend. The main reason she flew with him every year was that she got to sit in his lap, that was always her favorite part.
He'd taken the two younger children up with him when they weren't much older than Danny had been, but neither had liked being so far off the ground and Danny would always tell them they didn't know what they were missing. Danny.
It had been a week since he'd overheard his parents and not for the first time since then had Evelyn wanted to kick herself for being so careless. When the subject of Danny Walker had ever come up, she and Rafe had always been careful when they spoke of him in front of the children. They knew that Danny had been their father's childhood friend and a pilot and that he'd been killed in the war.
But now that the cat was finally out of the bag, Sarah and Joseph had a right to know what was going on. She and Rafe had asked his parents to take Danny into town to see a movie so they could talk to the other children about what had happened.
Rafe brought them up on the porch as Evelyn stood up. "Come on you two, let's go inside. Daddy and I have something that we need to talk to you about." She told them as she closed her sewing basket and folded Danny's dungarees on top.
Rafe opened the screen door and waited for his wife and two younger children to go inside. They all sat on the sofa, Joseph on Rafe's lap and Sarah on Evelyn's while they both explained about Danny.
"So Danny isn't our real brother?" Sarah finally asked.
Evelyn hugged her daughter. She knew how close Danny and Sarah were and didn't want that to ever change. "Danny is still your brother Sarah, your real brother."
Joseph frowned. "Mama, if Daddy isn't Danny's real daddy then who is?"
Rafe took a deep breath and sighed. He looked at Evelyn as though to tell her, I'll take this. He hugged his youngest close to him and sighed again. "Your brother's daddy was my best friend, Danny Walker."
"That's why you named him Danny?" Sarah asked her mother.
"Mama wanted to name him after me but I wanted to name him after Danny. That's why he's Daniel Rafe." He explained.
The children leaned back on their parents and they in turn tightened their hold on them.
Sarah sighed and looked at Rafe. "Daddy, does that mean that Danny can't call you daddy anymore."
He hadn't expected that question.
He could feel tears gather in the back of his eyes and blinked to clear them. "I know this is confusin' pumpkin, but Danny will always be able to call me daddy because I am."
Joseph's frown deepened. "I don't understand."
Rafe sighed again. "I was there the day your brother was born, just like I was for the two of you. I was there the first time he ever walked, the first time he said Mama."
"And Daddy." Evelyn reminded him with a gentle smile.
He grinned. "And Daddy. I was there when he lost his first tooth and when he learned to tie his own shoes. What I'm tryin' to tell you is that even though he ain't mine like you and your sister are, he's mine because I love him as much as I love the two of you."
That seemed to satisfy the children.
"Daddy, is Danny going to be okay?" Sarah finally asked him.
"I hope so honey." He said.
The four McCawley's sat together in silence until Evelyn got an idea to go through the family photo albums. She had started them not long after she and Rafe had been married to pass the time while he was away from her. In the first album, she had pictures of her and the nurses and of Rafe and the other pilots. He told them who they all were and who had not come through the war. They had pictures from the nightclub in New York and of his time in England. Rafe and Evelyn were animated while they talked about that time, but became quiet when they talked about his being shot down.
That was where their lives had taken a turn neither had expected and where Daniel Rafe McCawley had come to be.
They looked at each other as they noticed a picture of Rafe and his best friend, Danny's father. The children sat forward as their parents explained who the tall young man was with the brown hair and serious look. "That's Danny, that's your brother's father." Rafe explained.
Joseph looked at the picture. "Danny don't look like him Daddy, he looks like Mama."
He smiled. "That's what I always told your Mama."
Sarah also looked at the picture and sighed, to Rafe it sounded just like Evelyn. "He looks so sad Daddy."
Rafe nodded. "Yea. Danny had a hard life until his daddy died and he came to live with Gram and Gramps and me."
Evelyn opened the second photo album and there were pictures from the day she and Rafe were married by the Justice of the Peace, when she'd been pregnant with Danny. She looked at Rafe and they smiled at each other because it had been such a happy day for them both. The picture she saw in the album was of a radiant, if not rather large bride with the look of a woman deeply in love who stood next to her groom.
Sarah pointed to the picture. "That was Danny, Mama?"
Evelyn nodded. "And your daddy was with us before your brother was born." She told her daughter before she turned the page and saw pictures of a newborn Danny in his father's arms.
The picture Rafe saw was of a new father that hadn't slept in twelve hours because his new son was colicky and he was trying to let his wife sleep. Barbara had taken that picture when she'd come over to the house to help. He smiled at the memory.
"What are you smilin' at Daddy?" Joseph asked.
"Your brother had a pair of lungs. When he cried, everyone on the base heard him."
"Rafe." Evelyn admonished him with a gentle smile.
He grinned back at her. "All right, maybe not the whole base."
She shook her head and laughed. "Your daddy's just teasing."
Other pictures showed him as he fed baby Danny and as he gave him a bath. Rafe's favorite, though had been one that Evelyn had taken on a late afternoon when Danny was barely three months old. He'd fallen asleep on the sofa on the back porch of their house in Hawaii and the baby was asleep on his father's chest.
Evelyn had taken the photograph and had it blown up. For their first Christmas together, she had taken that enlarged photo and framed it for Rafe. It had sat on the bookcase shelf in Hawaii and when they'd returned to Tennessee, had been placed on the mantle over the fireplace.
They pored over the other albums until they heard the truck come up the drive. Rafe looked at his watch and realized it had been the better part of two hours that they had looked through all of the pictures.
Thomas and Sarah McCawley came in behind their eldest grandson who glanced at the scene on the sofa.
"How was the picture son?" Rafe asked him.
Danny shrugged his shoulders.
He looks like Danny when he does that. Rafe observed.
Thomas put a hand on Danny's shoulder. "I don't think it was quite what he was expectin'." And headed out to the kitchen.
"Haven't you eaten yet?" Sarah asked her son. "We've been gone for hours."
"We were going through the photo albums." Evelyn told her.
"You must be starving."
"Would you take the kids into the kitchen Mama? Evelyn and I would like to talk to Danny." And he lifted Joseph off his lap.
Evelyn did the same with Sarah. "We'll be in in a minute." And she patted the spot between herself and Rafe. "Come here for a minute son. Dad and I owe you an explanation."
Danny's look was a little dubious but did as his mother asked. He looks just like Rafe when he does that. Evelyn observed.
They sat quietly for a moment before Danny put his head on his father's shoulder and let out a sigh before he started to cry. "Just tell me why Daddy."
Rafe put an arm around his son's shoulders. "We will son, we will."
And after he sat up, Rafe and Evelyn McCawley had a talk with their son.