Don't Give Me Tainted Love novel · Chapter 18 of 24

Chapter 18: Mother

My mother met me at the door of the family house in her gardening gloves.

She had not gardened since my father died.

"Where's the boy?"

"With Melanie. Mom, what did he say?"

"Come into the kitchen."

She poured coffee neither of us touched.

She sat across from me, straight-backed, with her gloves in her lap, and she looked every one of her seventy years.

"He came at eleven last night," she said. "He was cheerful. He kissed my cheek. He said he'd like the key to your father's study, because he wanted to take something of Dad's for the dinner."

"What did you say?"

"I told him I'd lost it."

"Good."

"He smiled at me. He said, 'Then I'll use the one Dad hid in the desk.'" She folded the gloves over. "I realized he had been in there before. Many times."

I said nothing.

"Dalton, he asked where I'd seat Eric. He said, 'Next to me, Mother. It's time the boy knew whose chin he has.'"

I put my cup down.

My mother lifted her eyes.

"Eric has Bradley's chin," she said. "I've been looking at it for seven years."

"Mom."

"I knew at the christening. I told myself it was an accident."

"An accident how?"

"Eric is yours on paper, and as far as the world knew, in every way." Her voice sharpened. "But I told myself a chin was a coincidence, because I couldn't bear the other answer."

She was quiet for a while.

Out the window, the lake was flat and white.

"The night of the wake, I went upstairs at half past one," she said. "I needed to lie down. I'd been receiving condolences for six hours."

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