Single parents, when did your partner prove you completely wrong about them? #shorts #redditstories — Transcript

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1. 0:00Single parents, when did your partner
2. 0:01prove you completely wrong about them?
3. 0:03I'm a single parent and my daughter Wren
4. 0:04was eight when I started dating again,
5. 0:06two years after her dad died. Wren took
6. 0:07it harder than I knew how to fix. She
7. 0:09stopped talking much, stopped drawing,
8. 0:10and she made it her personal mission to
9. 0:12freeze out anyone I brought home. She
10. 0:14wasn't cruel about it. She was just a
11. 0:15closed door. Every person I dated
12. 0:17eventually got the message and stopped
13. 0:18coming around and honestly I didn't
14. 0:19blame them. So when Otis told me early
15. 0:21on, "I'll be straight with you. I'm not
16. 0:23really a long haul kind of person. I
17. 0:24tend to drift." I almost felt relieved.
18. 0:26At least this one was honest. I figured
19. 0:28I'd enjoy it while it lasted and not let
20. 0:29Wren get attached to one more person
21. 0:31who'd leave. I kept them apart as much
22. 0:32as I could. Otis and I only saw each
23. 0:34other on the evenings Wren stayed with
24. 0:35her grandma and I told myself it was
25. 0:37light, temporary, nothing that could
26. 0:38hurt either of us. That worked for about
27. 0:40three months, right up until I realized
28. 0:42I was in love with someone who'd told me
29. 0:43to my face they were going to drift
30. 0:45away. Then the small strange things
31. 0:46started. The first was the sawdust. Otis
32. 0:48would show up some evenings with fine
33. 0:49wood dust on their sleeves and in their
34. 0:51hair. And when I asked, they'd laugh it
35. 0:53off, helping a friend with a project.
36. 0:54Fine, people help friends. But it was
37. 0:56every week and Otis was not the handy
38. 0:57type. Then there were the Saturdays.
39. 0:59Every Saturday afternoon Otis was
40. 1:01unreachable. Phone off, no texts, gone
41. 1:03for hours. They never explained, just
42. 1:04said they had a standing thing. I'd been
43. 1:06burned before and my mind went straight
44. 1:08to the worst place. I started counting
45. 1:09the ways this was going to end. What
46. 1:11really got me was the receipt. It fell
47. 1:12out of their jacket pocket onto my
48. 1:14kitchen floor. A hardware store, a long
49. 1:16list, lumber, wood stain, brass hinges,
50. 1:18and a small can of the exact forest
51. 1:20green paint I hadn't seen in two years.
52. 1:22I knew that green. It was the green from
53. 1:23the half-finished treehouse in my
54. 1:24backyard. When her dad got sick, he'd
55. 1:26been building Wren a treehouse. He got
56. 1:28the platform up and one wall before he
57. 1:29could anymore. After he passed, I
58. 1:31couldn't bring myself to touch it or to
59. 1:32tear it down, so it just sat there, a
60. 1:34skeleton in the oak tree, slowly graying
61. 1:36in the rain. Wren wouldn't go near it.
62. 1:37I'd catch her looking at it from her
63. 1:39window sometimes, then pulling the
64. 1:40curtain shut. It was the one thing in
65. 1:41the house neither of us could say out
66. 1:43loud and I had quietly decided it would
67. 1:44just stay broken forever. I didn't say
68. 1:46anything to Otis about the receipt. I
69. 1:47didn't know what to say. So I just
70. 1:48started watching and I noticed something
71. 1:50I'd been too distracted to see. Wren had
72. 1:52stopped freezing them out. She'd started
73. 1:53leaving her door open when Otis was
74. 1:55over. Once I heard her actually laugh at
75. 1:56something they said And one night she
76. 1:58told me, with the first spark I'd seen
77. 1:59in her in two years, that she had a
78. 2:01secret project and I wasn't allowed to
79. 2:02ask about it. I found out the next
80. 2:04Saturday. I came home early from work
81. 2:05and the house was empty. And through the
82. 2:07kitchen window I saw them, Otis and
83. 2:09Wren, in the backyard, up in the oak
84. 2:10tree. The treehouse was finished, not
85. 2:12replaced, finished. They'd built onto
86. 2:14her dad's exact frame, the same green,
87. 2:16the same style, like the two halves had
88. 2:17always been one. Wren was up there
89. 2:19handing nails over one at a time,
90. 2:20talking a mile a minute, and Otis was
91. 2:22nodding along like every word mattered.
92. 2:24I went out and Wren saw me and froze
93. 2:25like she'd been caught. "It was supposed
94. 2:27to be a surprise," she said. Otis
95. 2:28climbed down looking like a kid who'd
96. 2:30broken a window. "The Saturdays," I
97. 2:31said. They nodded. "I didn't know how to
98. 2:33build anything. I've been taking a
99. 2:34woodworking class at the community
100. 2:35college since March, so I wouldn't wreck
101. 2:37what he started. I didn't want to finish
102. 2:38it for her. I wanted her to be able to
103. 2:39finish it with someone." They'd kept
104. 2:41every board her father cut. They'd
105. 2:42matched the green from a fleck scraped
106. 2:43off the old wall. There's a wooden sign
107. 2:45nailed by the ladder now. Wren made it.
108. 2:47It's a list of everyone allowed up in
109. 2:48the treehouse. It says her name and it
110. 2:50says Otis. It doesn't say mine. When I
111. 2:52asked her about it, she rolled her eyes
112. 2:53and said, "It's a kids and Otis
113. 2:54treehouse. You can come up if you
114. 2:56knock."