Page 82 of Fall onto me

When I became pregnant so young, I was happy but petrified. I was going to have this little life, a little mouth to feed when I could barely feed myself.

Then there was him.

I’m not talking about the man who you’ve grown up with, Skyler.

I’m talking about your father.

I lookup from the paper, stunned. She’s watching me, lifting herself off the ground with a valiant effort. The sheer terror she feels is attempting to pull her back down.

I return to the letter.

Him and I were in love, truly and deeply. But love doesn’t pay the bills. It’s hard for you to understand, I know this, because I can barely explain it myself. But growing up, I always needed more. I know now that more isn’t good, and you never have to forgive me. I don’t expect a single speck of forgiveness.

But you deserve to know the truth.

Day to day, I was deeply and hopelessly in love. But night by night, we were hungry.

I saw the way this would go, the same way my childhood went. I couldn’t bear to imagine you cold, or tired, or working minimum wage jobs to help us scrape by.

Of course, looking back at what you had to endure, I was terribly wrong. I would give my life to start over, to have you go hungry in a home filled with love.

The way you were raised here, in a castle filled with everything but love, is my deepest and most troubling regret.

I endured my own trauma, and this is no excuse for my actions, but I didn’t understand that my life with him would have been good and nothing like the way I was raised.

If you want to know his name, to find him, just ask … I wanted this decision, to be yours.

I’m sorry I made you take a path you didn’t have to take.

- Cara

The mahogany doorslams into the marble wall behind me, but I don’t bother to turn. I don’t care what enemy or lover hides behind me.

I try to placate the anger in my bones, and while I succeed at reining it in, my tone fails me. “What is this?” I cry out, shaking the paper in front of me.

Foster peeks around my side, and I let out a shaky breath when he grabs the note. Wes faces me, checking me over. “Are you okay?” he asks.

“No,” Mom whispers. “No, no, no.”

Wes looks at her, his blue eyes wide. “Car?”

Car? Why is he calling her that?

I look to his forearm, to that damned tattoo that I thought was just some silly lettering of what he does for a living. But it’s not.

The recognition in her eyes makes every single moment of my lie of a life flash before my eyes.

“Mom?” I can barely breathe, or much less focus on Wes right now. I need a distraction. “Wes was best friends with Foster’s dad. Did you know them too?” My voice is calm, and I can’t understand why.

She bows her head. “I did.”

Wes reaches his hand up and out but doesn’t move.

“So, you knew Foster was theirs?” I inquire.

“I did,” she repeats. “His parents were great people, Skyler. So is Wes.” She looks at him with a longing I’ve never seen in her before. “He was a … a really good man.”

With too many emotions whirling through me, I need to focus on something else. To disassociate from my reality. “Then why did you try to break me and Foster apart?” My lips tremble as I attempt to hold back tears.

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