Nov. 2005
A sigh escaped her lips as she rose from her seat. She had restrained herself from crying in the middle of her 4th period Art class. She was being released early, only to say good-bye to her father. He was leaving to go over seas today…far, far from home.

Upon reaching the airport, just minutes before his flight would depart, the girl stared eagerly into her father’s eyes. Anxiously waiting for an answer for her best friend’s sudden castoff. ‘Why are you leaving?’, she so desperately wanted to ask the man who had left so many times before. ‘You promised…You promised you would never leave again.’

As the thoughts rummaged bountifully through her mind, the strong, dark man’s eyes became sad…as if he could read the child’s every thought…as if he wanted to take the pain away.

They hugged good-bye…what a warm, caring hug it was…but it all seemed so short. Before she realized, she was out of her fathers arms, he was gone. For two long years…her best friend…her hero, would be gone.