I Love My Biker Father More Than Anything But What He Did On My Wedding Day Destroyed Me

But I kept something else. Dad’s old Harley—the one I’d learned on—was left to me in his will. Uncle Bear and I rebuilt it over the next six months, making it road-worthy again. I painted “Hawk’s Legacy” on the tank in silver lettering.

Today, one year later, I’m five months pregnant. Danny and I found out last week it’s a girl. We’re naming her Harper James Mitchell—Harper for Harley, James for Dad’s real name.

And yes, I’m still riding. The doctors say it’s fine until the third trimester. Every Sunday, I take Dad’s Harley out, and I ride the same routes we used to take together. Sometimes Uncle Bear rides with me. Sometimes it’s just me and the road and the memory of my father’s laughter.

People ask me all the time how I can ride after losing Dad. They say it must remind me of him in a painful way. They don’t understand that it does remind me of him, but in the most beautiful way possible.

Every time I twist that throttle, I feel his hands over mine, teaching me. Every time I lean into a curve, I hear his voice telling me to trust the bike. Every time I stop at that rest stop where Danny proposed, I remember Dad crying with joy.

Mom reached out last month after hearing about Dad’s death. She said she was sorry. She said maybe she’d been wrong about the motorcycle thing. She asked if we could have a relationship again.

I told her the truth. Dad never abandoned me. He taught me strength, independence, and how to find freedom on two wheels. He was there for every moment that mattered, and the one day he couldn’t be there wasn’t because he chose the road over me. It was because he was choosing to protect me from his pain.

That’s not abandonment. That’s love.

I also told her that when Harper is eight years old, I’m teaching her to ride. Just like Dad taught me. And if Mom can’t handle that, then she doesn’t deserve to be in Harper’s life any more than she deserved to be in mine.

Danny supports this completely. In fact, he’s already planning to teach Harper himself if something ever happens to me. We’ve already started a savings fund for her first bike.

Uncle Bear comes over every Sunday now. He’s teaching me advanced motorcycle maintenance so I can teach Harper when she’s older. He tells me stories about Dad I never knew—how Dad joined the Iron Guardians after Mom left because he needed brothers to help him raise a daughter alone. How Dad worked double shifts for three years to buy me that Honda Shadow. How Dad used to carry my picture in his wallet and show it to everyone he met, bragging about his fearless daughter.

“Your dad’s proudest moment,” Uncle Bear told me last week, “wasn’t any of his own accomplishments. It was the day you did your first solo ride. He called me at midnight, crying like a baby, saying his little girl didn’t need him to ride anymore. That’s when he knew he’d done his job right.”

But here’s the thing Uncle Bear didn’t understand, and what I wish I could tell Dad now: I always needed him to ride with me. Not because I couldn’t do it alone, but because everything was better with him there.

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