has been your entire life.”
I swallowed hard.
Mrs.
Whitaker leaned back in her chair.
“For eight years, I watched you figure everything out.”
I looked away.
That sentence hurt more than I expected.
Because she was right.
I had been figuring things out since I was twenty-six years old and Willa’s father, Daniel, decided that marriage and fatherhood were responsibilities he could simply step away from.
He hadn’t disappeared completely.
That almost would have been easier.
Instead, he had become an occasional text message.
A late birthday card.
A promise to take Willa for the weekend followed by a cancellation Friday afternoon.
He paid support when he remembered or when I pushed hard enough.
Mostly, it had been me.
Me and cleaning supplies.
Me and a used Honda.
Me and lists taped inside kitchen cabinets showing which bills could wait another week.
When I first started cleaning Mrs.
Whitaker’s
