Chapter 70

Getting married and having a child cemented the fact that I’m never coming home to take care of her again; this is not something she’d want to hear. These revelations won’t enhance her life, so I don’t have any hope of stirring up some long-forgotten maternal warmth from her. Once and for all, I need to realize I’m chasing the love of a woman incapable of giving it. For whatever reason, my mother has never been able to provide me with what I deserved, and I’m certainly not going to get it now. Maybe some women miss that essential gene, and I hope I’m not going to be one of them. The fierceness of that thought has me cradling my stomach protectively.

Maybe there’s some deeper cause that created Jocelyn Anderson, but I know for certain that I am not going to be the mother she is. My mother’s never spoken of her own childhood, her parents died before I was born, and I never knew them. Her past is a closed book, and I only know the life she put me through.

I stare down at my