Then I said the four words I’d been terrified to say.
“Graham, I’m pregnant.”
He looked from my face to the documents on the table.
“Celia,” he said quietly, “who’s the father?”
I couldn’t answer immediately.
Because the truth was sitting right there in the paperwork.
My name is Celia Weller. I’m forty-six years old, and until that August afternoon, I thought the worst thing my daughter could do was abandon me when I needed her.
Turns out, I hadn’t been giving Paige nearly enough credit.
I live outside Lancaster, Ohio, in a white two-story farmhouse with blue shutters and a porch my father built almost thirty years ago.
He built the oak bench, too.
He used to say good wood could survive almost anything if somebody cared enough to maintain it.
I believed him.
kertati
Unfortunately, I’d spent half my adult life applying that same philosophy to people who didn’t deserve it.
