I had just stopped at a lonely Missouri gas station, grabbing a drink and lighting a smoke. My shirt was still greasy from work, the sky threatening rain, and my only plan was to hit the road again.
Then I heard her voice.
— “Nico? Is that you?”
I froze. Nobody calls me that anymore. Not for years. I turned and saw an elderly woman leaning on a cane, standing by a broken vending machine like she’d been waiting.
— “Sorry… do I know you?” I asked.
She smiled and said softly, — “I’ve been looking for you.”
She gently took my arm, and for some reason, I didn’t pull away.
We walked slowly, and I asked who she was.
She only said, — “You look just like him.”
— “Like who?” I pressed.
A long pause. Then she whispered, — “My first love. You’re the spitting image. Nico Petez.”
I stopped in my tracks. That was my father’s name, long unspoken since he died in a motorcycle accident when I was thirteen.
— “Wait… how do you know my dad?”
Tears filled her eyes. — “We met in Missouri, 1987. My car broke down. He picked me up, said he’d give me the moon.”
It sounded just like him, though he never mentioned her.
— “Were you… together?” I asked.
— “Not exactly. Just a wild, beautiful week. He dreamed of California. I was running from my father’s farm.”
— “What’s your name?” — “Call me Miss Carol.”
I remembered the name. — “Hold on… my grandma mentioned you once.”
— “You’re Clara’s grandson?”
— “Yeah. You knew her?”
— “I always thought I was a secret.”
She asked me to drive her to her sister’s house. In my truck, she quietly said, — “He promised to write. I never got anything.”
— “He didn’t know about you. He married young.”
— “I let it go. But I always wondered.”
She handed me a photo of her and my father, laughing and young. — “Keep it. That week meant something.”
Outside her sister’s house, she smiled, — “Thank you, Nico. You helped me close a chapter.”
Days later, I received a letter.
“Nico — I never had a son with your father, but you’re the closest thing. Thank you for bringing me peace. — Miss Carol”
Inside was a check for $2,000.
A month later, a man delivered a storage unit from Carol, who had passed away. Inside: furniture, letters… and a 1968 Triumph Bonneville, with a note:
“He said this was his dream bike. He gave it to me in ’87. He never came back. Now it’s yours. Take it somewhere beautiful.”
I ride often now, for the peace of it.
And I think of her. Of him.
Of the quiet threads that tie us together—waiting to be found.