Not yet.
Eventually, telling me became even harder because she had waited for so long.
“Were you afraid I would leave?” I asked.
She didn’t dodge the question.
“Yes.”
Her voice broke.
“I was terrified that if you knew, you might look at me differently. That you might go searching for something else and stop seeing me as your mother.”
She squeezed my hand.
“It was selfish. I chose my fear over your right to know your own story. And I am so sorry.”
I sat on the edge of her hospital bed.
Then I took her left hand in mine.
The hand with the little blue flower.
The tattoo I had traced hundreds of times when I was a child.
“I’m not going anywhere,” I said.
She looked at me.
“Mom, look at me. I’m not going anywhere.”
Tears rolled down her cheeks.
“I love you.”
