Unloved

by Katy Regnery

You can’t miss something you’ve never known. You can’t long for something you never had.

It looks like hope, and I have a notion that my words are like the sun and Cassidy is like a sunflower after ten straight days of rain.

When she smiles, even I, damned from my very conception, cursed from the cradle, feel my heart soar. That’s how it is with angels, I’m learning. I bet the devil couldn’t stay away if he tried.

I rub her feet because I know she loves it. And I do it because I love her and never, ever—not for one second in any day between now and the one on which I die—will I forget that she is my life, my beating heart, my angel, and my salvation.