Meet Me Where the Oak Tree Grows novel Chapter 27

They said, "Lana, don't be scared. Just turn around, and you'll find a home waiting for you."

Everything I missed out on, they promised to make up for. I'd never had a birthday celebration, never heard a single "Happy Birthday," and I didn't even know my real birth date. The date on my ID was just a guess. Mom never told me the actual day; she said she couldn't remember. The only thing I knew for sure was that I was born in 1999.

That day, Aunt Marie gave me fourteen gifts, and Jonah took me to fourteen different amusement parks. They made this enormous cake for me, with fourteen candles on top.

Jonah smeared the first bit of frosting on my forehead, saying he wished to pass all his luck for the coming year onto me.

As I closed my eyes to make a wish, I heard "Happy Birthday" whispered in my ear for the fourteenth time.

They said the past fourteen years were behind me, and from my fifteenth year, it was a fresh start. From now on, any day I choose could be my birthday.

Fourteen-year-old Lana, worried that fate wasn't strong enough, decided to share a birthday with Jonah: June 26th. From then on, we celebrated our birthdays together every year. Aunt Marie was all smiles. She said she never expected to have both a son and daughter in her middle age.

Life has a funny way of giving you nothing, then sweetening the deal when you're down, only to snatch it away when you're hooked.

Just when I thought everything was looking up, my dad came back, buried in debt.