Epilogue
The guard motions for me to take a seat. I do as he says, tapping my foot nervously against the floor. After all these years, I’m finally seeing my mother again. It’s time, time to face my past and finally put it behind me.
A minute later, an older woman is led into the room. When she sits down across from me, I can barely hold in my gasp. She looks so different, like a totally different person. My eyes take her in, attempting to find a trace of the woman that attempted to raise me but there are none. In her place is a broken woman that looks way older than her years. The lines in her face double those in Lucy’s, even though Lucy is ten years her senior. Her once chestnut brown hair is now nearly solid gray, with only a few streaks of brown mixed in.
I finally pick up the phone and say, “Hello.”
“I haven’t seen you in years,” she replies, still as hateful as I remember. “What the hell do you want with me now?”
Sitting across from my mother, I’m more than thankful there is a thick piece of glass separating the two of us. I’m not scared of her, not exactly, but the thought of her touching me makes my skin crawl. I doubt she would even think of touching me anyway, but the glass will make sure she doesn’t get a chance.
Taking in a deep breath, I blow it out and force my next words to be polite as possible. “I thought we should talk.”
Mom has been in and out of jail since I left Cedar Springs. This time, though, she will be here for a while. More than likely, she will be here for the rest of her life. At some point in the last few years, she went from doing drugs to selling them. She made the colossal mistake of selling them within shouting distance from an elementary school. The judge threw the book at her.
“If this is about what happened between you and Kilo, I’ve got nothing to say,” she states, looking pissed off at the world. “You brought that shit down on yourself.”
Kilo is the last thing I would ever want to talk about. I’ve already had the closure that I needed with that; my husband made sure of that. Like Hank, Chance couldn’t leave things alone. He didn’t go to Cedar Springs, but he spent hours and hours online researching my mother and Kilo. At first, he didn’t say anything to me about it. But after a while, he came to me with the news that Kilo was dead. In fact, he was dead before I even met Chance.
Unlike Mom, Kilo never went to jail. There was no way the police could charge him with rape without me being there to make a statement. Since he wasn’t in the house when the police came in and found the drugs, he didn’t get charged with that either. Instead, he kept doing drugs until they finally killed him. He overdosed in his house all alone. By the time he was found, he had been dead for nearly two weeks. According to the article Chance found online, he was buried in a pauper’s grave on the outside of town.
To say I was relieved by his death would be a major understatement. By that point in my life, I wasn’t really scared of him anymore but I was frightened of what he would do to other women. If he hurt me, there’s no doubt in my mind that he would do the same to others without giving it a thought.
“I’m married now, have been for the last six years,” I say, trying to change the subject. “We have two sweet little girls.”
I don’t mention the beautiful little gift growing inside me. I haven’t even told Chance about my pregnancy yet. After having a miscarriage five months ago, I am keeping this secret to myself until I pass the first trimester. Chance spends every minute of the day trying to protect me by shielding him from the pain of another possible miscarriage, I am protecting him the only way I can.
The miscarriage hurt us both, but it also allowed me to see that there are things worse than what happened to me in Cedar Springs. Being raped nearly left me broken for years, but losing a baby nearly killed me. With Chance and our daughters’ love, I was able to move past it. If I can do that, I can get past my childhood and rape, too.
“Two girls.” She rolls her eyes, reminding me of my four-year-old daughter, little Lucy. “I hope they give you as much trouble as you gave me.”
She says this as if I should feel guilty. Guilty for what, I have no idea. There’s no way I caused her too much trouble. Even if I did, she wouldn’t have been around. She wasn’t around enough to know what I did or didn’t do. As a mother now, I realize just how much she missed out on. None of that bothers me anymore. If anything, since having children of my own, I feel sorry for her. There is nothing sweeter than listening to your babies laugh or seeing them smile. She missed all of that.
“They are both wonderful little girls,” I say, making sure to keep my voice calm. “They’re both beautiful and so smart.”
Reaching into my pocket, I pull out the one picture the guards allowed me to bring inside the visiting room. It’s a photo of Chance, the girls, and me. It was taken a little over a month ago, right after Jarrod and Adam’s wedding. Both girls are wearing pretty pink dresses with huge smiles on their faces. Chance is in his best man’s suit, looking as handsome as ever. I am leaning into his side, wearing a lavender bridesmaid dress.
I lift the picture up and point to my oldest daughter. “This is Lucy. She’s nearly four, and she is determined to grow up and become a princess.”
Mom doesn’t say a word, so I point to my youngest. “This is Sylvie. She’s only two. Right now, the only thing she is really concerned about is getting all of her Daddy’s attention and as much candy as she can fit into her mouth.”
Something deep inside me urges me to tell her that my daughters are named after their grandmothers, the only grandmothers they will ever know. I realize just how petty that would be, so I keep my mouth shut and wait for her to say something.
When she doesn’t open her mouth, I start to get angry. I’m not sure what I thought her response would be, but it definitely wasn’t silence. She never cared about me, but somewhere deep inside, I really thought she would care about her grandchildren. How someone could look at either of my daughters and not instantly fall in love, I will never know.
Searching my mind for something to say, I force out my next words. “My husband’s name is Chance. He and his brother own a construction company, two actually. One in Paducah and another in Macon, Missouri.”
After helping with the diner rebuild, Adam ended up moving to Macon. He moved in with Jarrod and started a new branch of Bluegrass Construction. It’s not quite as big as the one Chance runs, but it’s not missing it by much.
“Why the hell are you telling me all this shit?” she asks, finally breaking her silence. “I don’t know any of these people, and I doubt I ever will.”
I blink at her words, discovering tears are now filling my eyes. The tears are for the little girl who was always alone and the teenager who didn’t have the protection of her mother. I take a deep breath, force the tears away, and let the anger go. Finally, I let all the memories of the past fade away and know they will never bother me again.
“Do you not have anything to say to me?” I ask, attempting to break the silence. “Do you have any questions, anything you want to ask me?”
She looks at me for a second before nodding her head. “Could you put some money on my account, enough to get me a few packs of cigarettes? I haven’t had a smoke since the day I got in this place.”
My mouth drops open in shock, not believing she has the nerve to ask me for money. I shouldn’t be shocked, though. Mom was always out to get anything she could from anyone that was willing to give it. Well, I’m not willing to give her anything and never will be. She doesn’t deserve my money or anything else.
Seeing the anger on my face, she taps the window. “I’m your momma, and you need to listen to me. You better not walk out of here without putting some money on my account. If you do, you can just forget about ever coming back.”
I stare at her for a minute, trying to think of a response. So many things are running through my head, I can’t seem to focus on one. A part of me wants to scream at her, ask her how she could talk to me like that. Another part wants to cry and shout, accuse her of never being a mother to me. A larger part, the part Chance fell in love with, knows the only thing to do is say goodbye and walk away.
“I have a family now, a real family. They all love me, every single one of them,” I say, fisting my hand around the phone. “I have a wonderful husband, beautiful children, two brothers that would take a bullet for me, even parents. I don’t need you anymore. I’m not sure I ever needed you.”
I don’t give her a chance to respond. I just hang up the phone and push my chair back. Nodding my head at the guard, I walk out. Going through the process of leaving the prison, I realize my heart is lighter than it has been in years.
Walking toward the car, I lift my face to the sun and pull in a deep breath. Even with all the good years behind me, I never felt so unburdened in my life. The visit may not have gone the way I wanted, but it did give me the closure I needed to move on. That’s exactly what I plan to do, move on and forget that woman ever gave birth to me.
Reaching the car, I pull the door open and slide into the passenger seat. My eyes automatically go to the backseat to see both little Lucy and Sylvie asleep in their car seats. The urge to reach out and touch them hits me hard, to remind myself of the beauty that is my life, but I don’t. Instead, I let them continue to sleep peacefully.
“How did it go?” Chance asks, drawing my attention to him.
He hasn’t changed much since we got married. His waist has thickened a bit, which he blames on my cooking, but other than that he still looks exactly like he did the day we met. He’s also still just as wonderful as he was back then.
I lean closer to him, brushing my lips over his. “It sucked, but I knew it would going in, so that’s okay.”
“I still wish you would have let me go in there with you,” he says, reaching out and grabbing my hand. “I hate that you went to see her all by yourself.”
Ever since I told him my plan to come see her, he has been asking to come with me. At first, I planned on making the drive on my own. After he complained, I agreed that he could drive me, but I refused to let him come inside. I still do not want him to meet the woman that gave birth to me. After our meeting, I know I made the right decision.
I smile at him, squeezing his hand. “I needed to do this on my own.”
He reaches up and pushes my hair behind my ear. “You don’t have to do anything on your own ever again.”
Leaning forward, I brush another kiss across his lips. “You know, my heart stopped beating the day Kilo raped me. I swear, it just quit. At least to me, it felt like it did.”
He just stares at me, not saying a word, so I continue. “The day I met you, it started beating again. It started beating for you.”
He leans down, pressing his forehead against mine. “I love you, Gypsy Girl. I’ve loved you from the minute I laid eyes on you, and I’ll be loving you on the day I die.”
I smile, feeling my heart expand in my chest. “And I love you, Chance.”
The End