All those years, I’d wondered who had stopped for us. My father had tried to find him afterward, but nobody had gotten his name.
And now he was sitting beside me.
The old man I’d picked up in a blizzard.
Walter began crying.
“I’m sorry about your sister.”
I didn’t understand why he was apologizing.
“You saved us.”
He shook his head.
“Not all of you.”
He told me he’d been 37 when he encountered our wrecked car.
He’d helped me out first, then carried Emily to a safer spot while other motorists assisted my father.
Walter had stayed with us until the ambulance arrived.
A few days later, he contacted the hospital hoping for news. He learned Emily had died from her injuries.
He never discovered what happened to the rest of us.
“I’ve wondered about you for years,” he said. “Whether you grew up all right. Whether your father recovered.”