Woman Searches for Her Father for Years, Finds out He Works with Her in the Same Grocery Store — Story of the Day

A woman decides to find her bio father, but all she has is a vague memory of him and a few old letters. What'll happen when she discovers he's been near her all these years, at the same grocery store where she works?

Jemma sighed as she ran her fingers across her father's initials on the yellowed sheets of paper from her drawer. "Darren P." it read.

Jemma had never met Darren as an adult, but her father's letters made him sound like a close friend who adored her more than anything else.

Every time Jemma read those letters, a spark of hope ignited in her heart that she'd find him. But she had given up hope deep down. After all, it had been years since she had been looking for him, and there had been no progress.

Then, on her birthday, she received a message from a stranger wishing her all the happiness in the world. Tears rose in Jemma's eyes when she read the name at the end of the message. "Your father... Darren," it said...

Jemma was a little girl who loved pink dresses and pigtails when she was adopted by her foster parents. Lisa and Aaron gave her a loving home and never hid the truth about her adoption.

As a little kid, Jemma had met her father once when he visited her. She had rolled on his shoulders and played with him, and that was one of the happiest days of her childhood. But after that day, Jemma never saw him again.

Every cloud has a silver lining.

As an adult, she didn't remember his face, but she never forgot how happy she had been to meet him. Then one day, Lisa and Aaron showed her the letters he was writing to them, and Jemma cried as she read them.

"What about my mom? Why hasn't he written anything about her?" Jemma asked Lisa and Aaron as she finished reading the letters.

Lisa pressed her lips together. "She passed away, honey," she explained. "Some of his letters were misplaced, and I recall him mentioning your mother was no longer alive. He had written that he could not afford to raise you and had placed you in a shelter."

"Yet he came to see us," Jemma sighed. "He didn't abandon me... It wasn't his fault..."

"No, it wasn't," Aaron agreed. "But he visited us only once when you were 10, and then he never showed up. We expected him to return someday, but he didn't... And then the letters stopped."

That was the day Jemma decided to track down Darren. She went to the address on the envelope, but the house was deserted, and the last tenant had moved out years ago. Jemma was lost and had no idea where to find him because the agency where she was adopted had also closed long ago.

Every night from then on, Jemma sat with the letters and reared them, hoping to spot something that would help her in Darren's search. She was sitting with those letters again the night before her birthday, wondering if she'd ever see him.

As the clock struck 12 and Jemma officially turned 23, a message flashed across her phone screen. She would've ignored the notification but a stranger, a private number, wishing her happy birthday struck her as odd, and she opened the message to read it.

Tears streamed down Jemma's cheeks when she realized the sender was Darren…

"Hey, sweetheart… It's Dad. Happy birthday. I know we haven't met in years, but I couldn't help but wish you today. Thanks for leaving your details on the Facebook post where you posted my letters... Jemma, I've always been close to you. I knew I shouldn't have interfered with your life, so I stood back and watched you. I know we should've met, but I didn't have the guts to confront you... You can despise me for it... But, honey, I will always love you. Happy birthday!

Your father... Darren."

"Dad!" Jemma sobbed. "Why would you think I would despise you? I can't believe you're that silly! I found you... No, you found me!"

Jemma texted Darren back, laughing through tears, thanking him for his wishes, and said she wanted to meet him. She hoped they'd go out for dinner at a fancy restaurant and make up for their lost time together. So Jemma asked him if they could meet at her favorite restaurant.

A shock ran through Jemma when Darren replied and said he had been around her all this while at the grocery where she worked.

"You know about the grocery?" Jemma wrote back. "How? Did you, like, follow me there every day?"

"How about we meet there, honey?" Darren replied. "Call me when you arrive. I'll be there at the time your shift starts. I'm always on time."

"OK, Dad, I'll see you there. Please be there as promised. If you abandon me again, I will never speak to you again! Promise me," she wrote, to which Darren responded, "I promise, honey. I'm so excited to meet you after all these years... I love you too."

So the next morning, Jemma arrived at the grocery store on time, expecting a handsome man in his late 50s to approach her and introduce himself as her father. She couldn't believe her eyes when the loader she saw every morning loading goods onto the shelves approached her.

"Jemma? Hi, honey…" he said as he removed his work gloves and hugged her. "Sorry, the delivery truck arrived early today, and I got busy. How have you been these years?"

"Dad?" asked Jemma, shocked. "You… you work here?"

"Yes, I do," he replied. "I do… This was the closest I could get to my daughter, so I quit my job and moved here. Believe me, seeing you every day is what keeps me going."

Jemma's eyes welled up with tears. "You could have told me the truth sooner, Dad... Do you have any idea how much I missed you? And I looked for you, and..." Jemma burst into tears and cried into Darren's shoulders.

"Hey, sweetheart, I missed you as well," he said. "I'm sorry, Jemma, but I saw how happy you were in your new home, and I didn't want to take that away from you, OK? You had so much going on in your life... I didn't want to be a source of stress in your life. So I just stood back and watched. I knew the foster family would provide you with more than I could. But it's true that I always loved you, my baby girl."

"I love you, Dad," Jemma sniffed, and Darren smiled. "Your eyes," he said. "You get those from your mother, darling. I must say you're prettier than her! She'd be so happy to see how beautiful her daughter is…"

Weeks after this, Jemma took Darren home to her adoptive parents, and they've become like a family living in separate homes. Darren and Jemma are still working together at the grocery store and are delighted to be reunited after all these years.

What can we learn from this story?

• Every cloud has a silver lining. Jemma wasn't optimistic about finding Darren, but things changed one day, and she discovered Darren had been in her immediate vicinity all these years.
• What's meant to be will be. Darren and Jemma were destined to meet each other, and it happened despite all the hurdles that came their way.

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If you enjoyed this story, you might like this one about a woman who, after years of searching, finds her father in the nursing home where she works.

This piece is inspired by stories from the everyday lives of our readers and written by a professional writer. Any resemblance to actual names or locations is purely coincidental. All images are for illustration purposes only. Share your story with us; maybe it will change someone's life. If you would like to share your story, please send it to info@amomama.com.