Page 23 of Forever His This Christmas

“You know that’s not true. Abby,” Lisa said lifting her chin, meeting her gaze, “I would love to have you with me—but…”

“Oh, I know, you don’t have time for me. That’s what you said when you moved out here, but it looks like you have time for a boyfriend, so I guess that tells me where I stand. You don’t want to admit the truth to anyone. My friends were right, weren’t they? You don’t care about me. You don’t really love me. You left me with Diane so you could live your life without a kid getting in the way,” Abby fumed stalking out of the room and into the bedroom, slamming the door behind her.

Lisa took a few seconds to calm down before calling Diane to let her know Abby was at least safe—here, even if she didn’t understand the rest of what was going on at the moment.

“She’s here. I don’t know what happened yet, she’s upset and went back to the bedroom angry. I just wanted to let you know she’s safe, so you didn’t continue to worry. Let me talk to her and I’ll let you know what we’re going to do,” she told her as she headed to the bedroom and her thirteen-year-old daughter.

So many thoughts, worries and memories ran through her mind that she didn’t know what to do, what to think, until she found Abby curled up on the bed crying into a pillow.

“Abby, sweetie, come here,” she said softly moving onto the bed beside her, sitting down to pull her into her arms.

“I don’t want to live with Diane anymore. I want to be with you, Mom. Why can’t I be with you?” Abby asked and she lowered her cheek down to rest on Abby’s head as she soothed her.

“Shh, it’s okay sweetie. It’s okay,” she said over and over until the tears stopped. She sat Abby up and caught her gaze giving her a gentle smile as her heart swelled seeing her face, so close to her own that she couldn’t deny her anything. “I would love for you to stay with me Abby. I just didn’t want anyone to hurt you, didn’t want you all alone while I’m working.”

“I know that’s why I’ve been with Diane, but do you have to live all the way across the country from me? I miss you. I’ve really missed you the last few years. It never feels like enough time when you come see me, and the last few months…I know you have a boyfriend but…”

“I’ve missed you more than you will ever know, honey,” she admitted brushing the hair from her face. “I promise we’ll figure this out.”

“I don’t get it, Mom. Why didn’t you just tell someone about me? Were you that ashamed of me?” Abby asked and she knew she had to tell her daughter the truth—the real truth not just the bits she’d offered in the past. She’d rather she never had to,didn’t want Abby upset about any of it, but she couldn’t put it off any longer she realized.

It wouldn’t be easy, but she would do it and hopefully Abby would see that everything she’d done was to love her and protect her.

“Oh baby, I could tell you the reasons now or I can wait until you’ve had some rest, when you can understand my actions a little better?”

“You’re stalling Mom. You do this when you have to talk about something real. I want to know why—now. Please Mom. You missed my birthday this year—the first one ever so I think I deserve an answer, don’t you?”

“Okay,” she said settling them back onto the bed more. “You’ve asked me a hundred times about your father, and I’ve always told you the same thing…”

“That he was a jerk, and you hated him for wanting you to have an abortion,” Abby said, and Lisa nodded taking a deep breath to tell her the real story.

“He was a jerk—but he never knew about you,” she admitted.

“What?!”

“When I was fourteen, I started at the new middle school-high school. One of the teachers there instantly started to support me in ways the others never had. I thought he was the best. He paid attention to me in class, told me I could talk to him whenever I wanted, always would listen, and I worshipped him.” Lisa hated that she ever liked the man even a bit. It made everything else that happened so much harder to deal with.

“You’re saying that my father was your teacher? Eww…that’s so gross Mom.”

“I wish it were that simple sweetie. You know what my brothers are like, you’ve heard what my parents are like from Aunt Diane…he was different, and I let it blind me to the truth. He wasn’t a great guy, not even close. When I started freshmanyear, he became more attentive and more critical of my work. I thought he was just being hard on me to push me, make me actually work harder, but that wasn’t true. He did it so he could purposely get me alone with him. It was about two weeks into the year when he told me that I wasn’t going to pass his class so easily that year—that I would have to work ten times harder than anyone else just to get a C.”

“What? Wait, what are you saying?” Abby said, her face as confused as her own had been at the time. Barely older than her sweet girl was now, and she hated it—hated him for everything except Abby.

“I’m saying he made me do things for him, with him, in order to get the grade that I deserved.”

“He forced you to have sex with him?” Abby asked and she nodded trying to hold her emotions in. “Why didn’t you tell anyone?”

“I was fifteen, baby; I didn’t think anyone would believe me. The entire school knew I’d been gaga over him the year before, and they saw a difference in us that year. He threatened that he’d tell them I was lying because he’d turned me down after making a pass at him. So, I didn’t say anything to anyone.”

“How did he not know about me then—did he only force you that year?” Abby asked and Lisa could still see the confusion of it in her eyes, didn’t truly understand what it was like for her, and for that, Lisa was thankful. If her baby ever told her one of her teachers had touched her or looked at her inappropriately, she’d believe it in an instant. She’d never had that sort of trust with her parents though and he knew it.

Her father told her and her mother what to do and expected them to do it, hated being questioned, his demands to be questioned. It’d caused her more than a single problem as she got older and by middle school, her relationship with both of her parents was at the most basic level. They didn’t trust her toknow what was best for the most basic things, no way would they have bought the total one-eighty when she’d been raving about the man the prior year to suddenly buying that he was forcing her or trying to force her to do anything.

“I wish, but no, he blackmailed me into continuing it over the summer and into the beginning of the next year. He reset my schedule when I tried to get my science classes with another teacher, refused to sign the drop slip for me to change it back after the year started. It was October when I realized I was pregnant with you, by then I was already three months along and went to the doctor a few towns over to keep anyone from seeing me. I had a choice to make—keep carrying you or an abortion. I couldn’t do it, but I knew if I kept carrying you, he’d find out. I was terrified of what he’d do if he did. If nothing else, it would prove that he slept with me…it would have ruined his life even if I said I’d agreed to it.”

“Because you were under sixteen when it happened and his student, he’d never work again, would be arrested,” Abby said, far too wise for her young years thanks to the news.

“Yeah, but I didn’t want it to get out. The town is small, having people know what happened…I was too scared to chance it.”

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