“Honey,” Dad said sharply.
I jumped to my feet. “Don’t make this about you. This has nothing to do with how much family I do or do not have. This is about you withholding information I had a right to know about my life. Don’t change the subject because it’s uncomfortable for you.”
Mom physically gawked. “Well, then.”
Dad shoved himself to his feet. “We don’t have a good reason as to why we did it.”
“I want to hear it from Mom,” I said.
She looked up at me. “And why is that?”
I snickered. “Because I honestly believe you think you’ve done nothing wrong, and you couldn’t be further from the truth.”
That’s when she blinked back tears. “Whatever explanation or reasoning I can give you isn’t going to hold up to what you’re looking for.”
“And yet, you could still try,” I said curtly.
Dad walked over to Mom and guided her to the bed. He sat her down, holding her close and wrapping his arms around her as if to protect her.
What the hell had happened?
Dad cleared his throat. “Maybe we should all take some time to—”
“Dad?” I asked.
“Yeah, princess?”
I nodded at Mom. “Stop interjecting and let her get it out. It’s clearly been eating away at her for a while. She deserves a chance at peace.”
For many people, they never see their father cry. But that wasn’t my household. That wasn’t the way that I grew up. Dad was the one that taught me about my emotions. He was the one that helped me navigate mood swings during my teenage years. It was Mom that never cried. It was Mom that was the strong, stalwart soldier of the family.
And watching those tears slide down her cheeks broke my heart.
“Mom,” I said as I took her hands in mine and sat back down beside her, “just tell me what in the world happened.”
She drew in a broken breath. “My health issues had already cropped up by that point.”
“And you didn’t know if you could afford two children?” I asked.
She shrugged as she gazed over my shoulder. “That, and—”
Dad leaned over and kissed her cheek. “Tell her. I think you need to say it out loud, too.”
I squeezed Mom’s hands, urging her to talk with me. Urging her to just spit it out. It was clear she was ashamed. Embarrassed of whatever answer she was about to give. But I’d never seen her struggle like that. I’d never seen her work so hard to keep her emotions at bay.
I’d never seen her fail at it, either.
“We were so inundated with medical bills,” she said with a tremble in her voice, “and things were bleak. They were—oh God, Brielle, it was probably the hardest time in our marriage.”
She sniffled, and I rubbed her back. “Keep going, Mom. You’re doing great.”
Her watery stare fell toward her lap. “We had signed up to be adoptive parents well before things got bad with my health. We had everything set up, you know? Your room. A savings account for college. A few clothes, some diapers. Things to get us started for when our child finally found us, you know?”
“And then, the downhill started,” Dad said.
Mom lifted her gaze and scoffed. “Around the time we got the call that your biological mother was searching for an adoptive family, I was three weeks into being on the transplant list for a new kidney. Dialysis was arduous, and there were a few moments there where I didn’t think I was going to make it.”
“Oh, Mom,” I said softly.
