Chapter 13 - Twelve Years Late
My son had not died in that rural clinic. For twelve years, the child I wept for in the dark had sat just three chairs away from me at every Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Sunday family dinner. He had hugged me, smiled at me, and affectionately called me “Aunt Lauren.”
The sheer magnitude of the betrayal threatened to crush me, but the desperate need to see him pulled me off the kitchen floor.
The next morning, I drove to Natalie’s house incredibly early. I knocked, and Oliver answered the door himself. He was twelve years old, gangly and thin, his dark hair messy from sleep, wearing his usual oversized New York Yankees jersey.
“Aunt Lauren?” he asked, rubbing his eyes. “Why are you here so early? Mom's still asleep.”
I stared at his face, mapping the contours of his cheeks, completely unable to find my voice. The only thing my traumatized brain could think to say was utterly ridiculous.
“Have you... have you eaten breakfast yet?”
He shook his head, looking confused.
May you like
I walked past him into the house. I moved into the kitchen like a machine, pulling out pans and ingredients. I made him scrambled eggs and black beans, seasoned exactly the way he liked them. He climbed onto the island stool, cheerfully tapping on his phone and telling me an elaborate story about a new video game. It was exactly like the hundred other times I had cooked for him over the years, completely unaware that I was feeding my own flesh and blood.
I stood by the sink, gripping the edge of the counter, watching him cut his eggs with a fork, barely keeping my fractured soul together.
