Aaron were furious, told the elopers, interlopers more like, stay away from the wedding. but they couldn t pretend it hadn t happened. and when they hit the little bumps most young marriages encounter, it colored everything. did your father and her mother s relationship have anything to do with what happened to you and shannon? you know, we were pretty determined not to let their relationship have an effect, but, you know, it s always something that s in the back of your head. after a year and a half, shannon and aaron divorced. pam and ralph s marriage, on the other hand, thrived. they moved into a big house on a corner lot in the walsenburg, an owed coal mining town about 50 miles south of pueblo. they opened up an antiques mall in the center of town. then bought a vacation home in oregon. that was the happiest i ever remember seeing her.
a deadly attack in the dark of night. her mother murdered. i realized that last conversation i had with her, that was it. his father bruised and bewildered. i don t remember anything else, other than waking up in the morning. was it a robbery? the television s on. was it darker? you re always going to look at the closest people to the victim. or was it something much darker? you were 11 years old when your mother disappeared. a missing woman, a murdered woman, and a lie. i didn t get through more than a page and a half, and i threw it. i could barely stomach to finish it. welcome to dateline. shannon and aaron were young, in love. and engaged to be married. but their family was rocked by scandal. then murder. aaron s father was found at the
Says he is prepared to die in prison. i don t have anything to look for. except maybe forgiveness. from who? for my boys. that s why you re talking today? exactly. yes. well, it s between you and them. i ll tell you my take on it, you got some distance make up. i know i do. i ve got a lot of makeup. of the countless things keith school from his family, resilience was not one of them. aaron and zach are closer than they ve been in years. and now they know what s happened to their mother, they say that they can finally mourn her passing. and focus on keeping her spirit alive for those two little granddaughters, who were the center of her universe. my oldest daughter will remember. she talks about almost every day. we have pictures of her in her room. as mangoes gets older, will teller of the nascar nana story, about when she was born and never let her memory die. that s all for this edition of dateline. i m craig melvin.
Candelario was 11 years old. his parents has recently separated were sharing custody. one day after a weekend at his dad s house, aaron went home to find there was just a note on the coffee table that was in kind of sketchy handwriting, but nevertheless said, i love you, my boys, and i m taking off. his mother, dina, was simply gone. aaron was devastated. what did your father suggest may have happened to her? that she possibly had moved to missouri. a guy that she had been talking to online for quite some time, you know, maybe she ran away to be with him. a missing persons case was opened, but nothing came of it. aaron and his brother moved in with ralph full-time. but aaron couldn t move on. she had to have left some trail somewhere. barely a teenager, he taught himself every web search engine, looked for years. but found no sign of his mom online. and a terrible suspicion took hold of him, hardened into something
To public school, but pam wouldn t have it. she always wanted us to be this tall and be her little girls. you know, she very genuinely loved us, and we were her world. you were her reason to be. yes, oh, yeah. but finally, when it was time for high school, pam relented. i think she realized that you can t control an environment for a child forever, though. what was it like to make the transition? it was a culture shock. it was different. i was there maybe a week and my new friends are like, let s educate you on the ways of the world. i was like, oh, my gosh. which, of course, included boys. two of my girlfriends are like, there s this guy, and you need to meet him, and i think you two are really going to get along. i thought, aw, great. the guy was aaron candelario and before long i was in love. yes. i was very much in love.