Our Fatal Failings (Twisted book two)

Chapter Thirty-Two (The End)

The woman standing in front of me will surely be me in twenty years. Shoulder length hair, worn like a pillow around her shoulder, dark skin, laugh lines. Although I hope I'll have fewer worry wrinkles.

But that is not the point

We feel like strangers now. I can't talk to the mirror of myself.

"Did you hear about the bill?" I ask. "Is that why you came?"

Instead of giving me an answer, her eyes drop to my pregnant swollen stomach. "You're pregnant."

"Have you come to meet my pups then? You're strangers to them?"

Her eyes come back up to meet mine, wide and startled as though she were a young child. I don't like to see her this way. "Multiple?"

"I sent you an announcement after each birth. You never replied. Did you throw them away?" She rubs the back of her neck. So she threw them away. "Five born, we're going on six."

"So many..." My mother whispers. "Don't you think it gives him control, to keep you pregnant?"

"No." The word is clipped, curt. "No, I don't think it does. I have active pregnancies. The belly doesn't stop me from doing my policy work or making my speeches, as you've seen today. It's only the last month where I slow down and that's just a little."

"But still..."

"What did you come for?" She looks up and her fingers cover her mouth. Why is she acting as if I've slapped her? It's been a decade since I've seen her. "Why now? To tell me the same things from ten years ago no less." I place a hand over my chest. My heartbeat is rising and my face is growing flushed. Jonah will know soon, that's it's more than just excitement if I don't keep calm. "Why?"

"I wanted...I saw you on the television and I...wanted to see if we could start fresh."

"How do you start fresh with your mother?"

She winces. If it was harsh, then good. She never even apologized for poisoning me. "I don't know. But we could try."

"Where's Dad?"

"He...isn't doing well. The doctor said it's heart disease, but a witch said he needed to go back to his pack and face what he's done. She thinks it's a spiritual disease."

"She might be right."

Mother nods and clasps her hands in front of her. "Maybe we could start again, Imani? I miss you. I truly miss you."

"And you never cared that I missed you. It never made you change your behavior." I cross my arms, waiting for the "But I.." That's how her excuses always start. Or they devolve into plain insults. She started getting sloppy with them before we parted ways.

"I know." The words snap me back into reality. "I was a horribly selfish mother who had no place being one." A tear runs down her cheek, one I ignore. She doesn't need my sympathy. This is a situation of her own making. "And I ruined everything from day one. But instead of asking forgiveness, I kept ruining things. I dug us into a hole, farther and farther and I-"

She gasps before wiping her cheeks. "I promise, we'd reconcile slowly, Imani. I'm in no place to jump back into your life." She chuckled, weak, and dry. Why even do it when we're both about to cry. "And I have no right."

I blink away oncoming tears. "I'm glad you know."

"I won't bring your Father. Not until he's ready. I don't think we're on the same page anymore."

"Good idea." I turn toward the hall of celebration. Where I should be. "And you won't tell anybody. Especially not Jonah. Maybe after the baby is born." My hand drifts across my stomach. Because he gets worked up during my pregnancies. Maybe it's a matter of control. Or maybe it's extreme paranoia, brought about after feeling my first birth without being able to see it. Because I remember the first time, I thought I would die. I was angry, then sacred then horrified before going under altogether. Did it traumatize him? It sounds like something to bring up to the therapist.