3

Whenever the church nursery door opens, Daniel remembers his parents left him there. He's only one. Maybe he worries his parents will never come back. Two hours later, they always do.

I was a little late today. I opened the door to come in the room. He stopped playing happily with his cars and started to cry.  He didn't want to play with anything anymore and hid behind the rocking chair.

"Where's Daniel?" I said. "Where did Daniel go?"

Marli saw him run and hide behind the chair too.

"He's over here!" she said.

"Oh, is he under the table? No, he's not under the table," I said.

"He's over here!" Marli said again.

"I think he's hiding under the slide."

"No, he's over here!" She pointed to him.

"There's Daniel! He's behind the rocking chair," I said.

He was still crying but he ran up to me and let me hold him tightly in my arms. I stood with him until my back started to ache and then we sat in the rocking chair. I cradled him there for fifteen minutes or so. For a while, I thought he'd fallen asleep, but he was just relaxed.

Samantha brought us a toy helicopter with a propeller that whirls like a fan. We played with it until Daniel was happy enough to get down and play with other toys.

He stayed happy for a long time.......until someone else opened the door.