At three in the morning, feeding Evelyn in the rocking chair again, I thought about all of it.
I thought about the six years. All those months of shame. That word, unexplained, sitting on my chest like a stone.
It had never been unexplained. Not to him. Not to Diane. They had the explanation the whole time. They just kept it in a drawer and let me carry the weight.
And then I thought about Ben at nineteen. A scared college kid, sick and bald from chemo, lying in a hospital bed while his father packed a suitcase. Being told he’d never have children. His mother, terrified and abandoned and furious, saying: never tell anyone. Never let anyone see the broken part of you, or they’ll leave.
I didn’t want to feel sorry for that boy. But I did.
That was the worst part. I couldn’t just hate him. It would have been so much easier if I could.
