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That was when she had decided she had to get out of the Kamaras family’s lives. Alex had betrayed her before he died, that much was true. But she couldn’t tell his parents that. And if it ever came to light...
When she had found out she was pregnant, she was only more determined to stay away. Constantine didn’t want her. What had happened between them wasn’t romance. It had been an exorcism. And something beyond them both. It had been sharp and ugly, even as it had been beautiful. And she knew...she knew he would hate this. And added to that...
How would she ever explain it to Alex’s parents? It would compound all the pain that they had been through that she had... That she had slept with Constantine. While she was still... She was still with Alex. It did not matter that he had been cheating on her, that she had decided to break it off, she had not done so yet. And he had given her so much. That was where things like the gift of tuition, and all of the wonderful, glorious things he had showered on her during the time they were together began to model things.
Because surely she owed Alex more than he ever owed her. And now he was dead. And she mourned him, even these months later, even with the way he had betrayed her. Because in the end, she would look upon that relationship with... With joy. How could she look upon it with anything else?
And if nothing else, it had led to this.
Of course you don’t feel an overwhelming sense of joy about this.
She looked down at the undeniable bump that seemed prouder than necessary.
Yeah. It was true. She wasn’t feeling joy right at the moment. She was still in the throes of denial.
But she knew that... Once the baby was born...
No. She didn’t know any of that. And she was terrified.
Because her mother had not been suffused with an injection of maternal joy and delight, so how could she count on the same?
They’d moved apartments all the time when she was a child, living in small, rundown studios, or sometimes with whatever man her mother was dating. Often her memories blurred, the settings amalgams of one another.
Whenever she pictured herself, it was sitting in the kitchen with yellow, flowered wallpaper, by herself.
She had one memory in particular of sitting there, kicking her feet against the legs of the chair in time to the clock on the wall.
She’d been invited to a birthday party. They were supposed to go to the zoo and Morgan had never been.
Her mother hadn’t wanted to take her to buy a gift for her friend, so Morgan had walked to the corner store and used money she’d earned from watching her neighbor’s cat while they were out of town and bought her friend a small off-brand doll. She’d wrapped it in tissue and waited for her mother to come home to drive her to her friend’s house.
She hadn’t come home.
Morgan had sat in that chair, hoping, until long after the party was over. And then she’d cried as she’d made her own dinner.
When her mother had finally come home Morgan had asked why she’d forgotten and her mother had yelled at her about how she’d taken an extra work shift, and she didn’t need Morgan making her feel guilty about silly things when she was already overworked.
Morgan had been eight.
The thing that scared her the most was the way her mother was...no matter how many other men there were, she was obsessively angry at Morgan’s father.
And while Morgan had her own issues with having a father she’d never met, who didn’t want her...
She could remember the time her mother had looked at her and said: It’s a shame. You have his eyes.
Like a failure or an accusation.
It was no accident Morgan had lost touch with her mom.
She’d visited at first, after she’d moved out. Then she’d turned those visits into phone calls that were less and less frequent. She’d made excuses about school. She’d called on her mom’s birthday, Mother’s Day, Christmas. That was all.
Then she’d started dating Alex.
“Sorry, Mom, school and... I have a new boyfriend so I’m just really busy.”
Since Alex’s death she hadn’t called her mother once.
What if she was a bitter, distant mother just like her own?
