Born in Shame Read Free Page B

to him, you see. It was power.
    â€œI left that house with never a regret, with the money I had in my wallet, and a single suitcase.”
    Shannon felt as though she were underwater, struggling for air. But the image came clearly through it, of her mother, young, pregnant, nearly penniless, carrying a single suitcase. “There was no one to help you?”
    â€œKate would have, and I knew she’d suffer for it. This had been my doing. What shame there was, was mine. What joy there was, was mine. I took a train north, and I got a job waiting tables at a resort in the Catskills. And there I met Colin Bodine.”
    Amanda waited while Shannon turned away and walked to the dying fire. The room was quiet, with only the hiss of embers and the brisk wind at the windows to stir it. But beneath the quiet, she could feel the storm, the one swirling inside the child she loved more than her own life. Already she suffered, knowing that storm was likely to crash over both of them.
    â€œHe was vacationing with his parents. I paid him little mind. He was just one more of the rich and privileged I was serving. He had a joke for me now and again, and I smiled as was expected. My mind was on my work and my pay, and on the child growing inside me. Then one afternoon there was a thunderstorm, a brute of one. A good many of the guests chose to stay indoors, in their rooms and have their lunch brought to them. I was carrying a tray, hurrying to one of the cabins, for there would be trouble if the food got cold and the guest complained of it. And Colin comes barreling around acorner, wet as a dog, and flattens me. How clumsy he was, bless him.”
    Tears burned behind Shannon’s eyes as she stared down into the glowing embers. “He said that was how he met you, by knocking you down.”
    â€œSo he did. And we always told you what truths we felt we could. He sent me sprawling in the mud, with the tray of food scattering and ruined. He started apologizing, trying to help me up. All I could see was that food, spoiled. And my back aching from carrying those heavy trays, and my legs so tired of holding the rest of me up. I started to cry. Just sat there in the mud and cried and cried and cried. I couldn’t stop. Even when he lifted me up and carried me to his room, I couldn’t stop.
    â€œHe was so sweet, sat me down on a chair despite the mud, covered me with a blanket and sat there, patting my hand till the tears ran out. I was so ashamed of myself, and he was so kind. He wouldn’t let me leave until I’d promised to have dinner with him.”
    It should have been romantic and sweet, Shannon thought while her breath began to hitch. But it wasn’t. It was hideous. “He didn’t know you were pregnant.”
    Amanda winced as much from the accusation in the words as she did from a fresh stab of pain. “No, not then. I was barely showing and careful to hide it or I would have lost my job. Times were different then, and an unmarried pregnant waitress wouldn’t have lasted in a rich man’s playground.”
    â€œYou let him fall in love with you.” Shannon’s voice was cold, cold as the ice that seemed slicked over her skin. “When you were carrying another man’s child.”
    And the child was me, she thought, wretched.
    â€œI’d grown to a woman,” Amanda said carefully, searching her daughter’s face and weeping inside at what she read there. “And no one had really loved me.With Tommy it was quick, as stunning as a lightning bolt. I was still blinded by it when I met Colin. Still grieving over it, still wrapped in it. Everything I felt for Tommy was turned toward the child we’d made together. I could tell you I thought Colin was only being kind. And in truth, at first I did. But I saw, soon enough, that there was more.”
    â€œAnd you let him.”
    â€œMaybe I could have stopped him,” Amanda said with a long, long sigh. “I