How Not Enough Nuts and Raisins ends…

     As some of you who were being so kind as to read along with my writing of Not Enough Nuts and Raisins might realize I have closed it down. But I feel that I owe it to my few readers to let them know, “the rest of the story.” And why I stopped writing it.      When I started to write the last few chapters of how Toba’s life was happy and looked promising one minute and the next was torn to shreds by this controlling old man, I realized how this fictional character, shaped around the real one in my life, was bringing all those old feelings up again. All the broken feelings of being disappointed over and over and over when he never kept his promises. Promises I realized years later that he never intended to keep. They were only to pacify the moment of having to deal with the poor luck of being saddled with another daughter and not one thought was given to how it affected me personally.
     I thought writing this would be therapeutic, but all I find it is doing is stirring the pot. I had to ask myself a very important question, “What’s the point?” I learned to go on, I survived the years of pain and I think I ended up with the greatest possible result. I have a heart. How I ended up having a heart is a miracle. I guess when you get trod upon by someone who you loved for so long you just have to one day break free of it. You realize that it isn’t you, and what finally helps you see that truth is what you kept asking yourself for years, “What in the world did I do so wrong?”  When you come to the awakening that it wasn’t you and you didn’t DO anything but that destructive personality that you endured was the real problem it is like walking into the sunlight.

 So, the story was to have a happy ending . . .

      Toba was going to hang in there facing daily onslaughts of Mr. Gilbert’s verbal bashing and passive-aggressive cutting remarks. Eventually, due to the onset of winter, Toba would move into a spare room in the old house. Of course he would have to endure several ‘schoolings’ on what to touch and what not to touch. When asked to retrieve some old papers one day he will stumble upon some pictures as well. It becomes apparent that the old man does have some family and that he and they are estranged. (Not surprising.)

     The old man will have to open up to Toba some things about his past when he is slated to be part of recognition of a branch of the military being honored after many years. Mr. Gilbert was in the Merchant Marines and according to his story to the news, his ship was sunk and he and a few mates spent time in a lifeboat.
     Toba being the nature that he is, begins to understand that perhaps there is good reason for the old man being as nasty as he is. Of course it will take a turn when Toba tries to be too understanding and also questions the picture of a young woman he finds in all the papers.
     Mr. Gilbert will become enraged and this will set off s series of accidents which Toba will be blamed for and eventually a trip to the hospital for the old man. With his memory slipping and his natural tendency to treat Toba unkindly his remarks will reflect to the authorities that Toba is nothing to him and that he caused his fall.
     Thus Toba will end up in jail. Having no one to call on for help he reconnects with Mr. Crown who comes to his rescue and along with it a conversation concerning what little is known about Toba’s earlier years.
     When the authorities are satisfied that Toba isn’t the culprit he is made out to be. He is released and he goes back to the old house. Curiosity gets the best of him and he does a little out of character snooping. He finds an old police report of a run away girl involving Mr. Gilbert and realizes that it might be this daughter he refers to at times.
    He takes the report and finds himself at the local library looking for whatever information he can. His intent at this time is simple to see if he can reunite the old man and this daughter before it is too late.
     Skipping ahead, he does find an email address and he informs the girl, Samantha Gilbert, about how he became to interact with the old man and might she be his daughter? While Toba is at the hospital, the old man tells him that the only way he will be released is if he has someone staying with him. Once again Toba’s good-natured ways are called upon to forgive the old man and accompany him home.
     They aren’t there long when a visitor arrives. Samantha Gilbert arrives unsure if her coming was the right thing to do. Her unexpected return sends Mr. Gilbert into an all out judgmental attack on not only Samantha, but Toba, spewing his accusations and rage. This old man’s life of control is being turned on him and he just simply cannot take the natural reimbursement of a lifetime of cruelty. With his health failing he experiences a massive heart attack and with his final breath he offers one last heartrending blow. Although on one hand he acknowledges Samantha as his daughter it is quickly squelched with his unrelenting decision to disown her. When all the dust of the old man’s death settles, Samantha and Toba are left to pick up what pieces are left and make some sense of how they both were thrust into the old man’s life.
     Samantha opens up and shares how she ran away years ago because of her getting pregnant and the old man disowning her. It isn’t until she tells Toba of the greatest heartbreak of her life was leaving her baby boy that she knew she could never take care of in a hospital lobby one night wrapped in an old feed sack she found as she fled her father’s home.
     Toba’s shocked reaction to hearing from Samantha Gilbert the one and only thing he ever knew about who he was, will close the story with not the expected reconciliation of a coldhearted father and brokenhearted daughter, but the reconciliation of two innocent individuals who though mistreated at the hands of an unforgiving spiteful bullying old man find the most important missing pieces of their lives.
     The end . . . in many ways.