I thought about it for a long time before I answered.
“Because the thing that nearly destroyed us wasn’t his infertility,” I said finally. “It wasn’t even the red hair. It was the secret. It was eleven years of shame that he was taught to hide, by a mother who was taught to hide hers, by a man who ran away from a sick kid in a hospital bed. That shame got passed down like an old coat. Nobody ever took it off. They just kept handing it to the next person.”
“And now?”
“And now he’s taking it off,” I said. “Piece by piece. In front of me. Where I can see it. That’s the only reason I’m still there. Not because he said sorry. Lots of people say sorry. Because he finally stopped hiding.”
Rachel stirred her iced tea for a long time.
