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Mama answered, a look of shock registering on her face for a moment. Then she nodded as if she’d been expecting me all along.
“Come in.” She offered me a seat in her small living room, neatly and colorfully furnished. “You look…different. Radiant.”
“That’s a word for ‘scared shitless’ I haven’t heard before,” I said and heaved a breath. “I’m pregnant.”
Mama’s eyes widened, and for a moment, I thought she was going to hug me or cry. Or both. But she bottled herself back up and indicated for me to sit on her neat couch in her neat living room.
“Ronan’s?”
“Of course,” I said stiffly.
“The one who’s now in prison?”
I crossed my arms. “Yes. For a crime he didn’t commit.”
Mama pursed her lips as if she’d heard all that before. “Would you like some water? Something to eat?”
“I’m fine.”
“Are you going to keep it?”
The question caught me off guard, whacking me in the chest. “And they call me direct. Must’ve gotten it from you.”
She arched a brow.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t think so. I can’t imagine trying to get a business that already crashed and burned back on its feet while raising a baby, alone.”
“So you came to me?” Mama shook her head, her curls falling around her face, softly.
“I have no advice. I’ve done nothing but make mistakes. Starting that night with your father.”
“You didn’t make a mistake that night, Mama. What he did to you…that wasn’t your fault.” I shifted on the couch. “But I have to know…why did you keep me? You had every right not to.”
“Because I thought I could do it,” she said. “I was like you. Strong. Driven. Ambitious. I wasn’t going to let anything stop me. Not my broken heart or the violation of my body by someone I thought loved me. So I pushed through. I tried. For four years, I tried, but every time I looked at you, instead of seeing the beautiful child you are, I saw him lurking beneath.” She shivered and hugged herself. “Pushing through didn’t work. I couldn’t keep you and I hated myself for giving you up. I’ve been stuck in that purgatory for years.”
“And now?”
She looked at me, her dark eyes heavy. “Does it matter? There’s nothing left of me.”
“That’s not true,” I said. “But Mama, did you ever get help? Talk to someone professionally?”
“I never told anyone what happened until the day I gave you to Bibi.”
“Why not?”
“It was humiliating and degrading and I’m already a private person. I don’t like anyone in my business. I try to work hard and take care of myself.”
I sat back, marveling to hear my words come out of my mother’s mouth.
“You could have been talking about me,” I said. “I’m private and a workaholic. And…closed up.” My hands went to my belly. Until Ronan.
“I’m sorry, Shiloh,” Mama said. “For ruining your grand opening. For not being there for you. For failing you so badly.”
I moved to sit next to her and took her hand. Mama stiffened, then clutched mine back as if, now that she had it, she didn’t want to let go.
“You didn’t fail, Mama. You never had help. There are certain things we just aren’t made to face alone,”
I thought about Ronan in prison, how he believed being alone was the best thing he could do for me.
