Chapter 21: Every Excuse

"What was I supposed to do?" my mother screamed again, into the silence.

I still held the microphone.

"You could have asked someone for help," I said.

"I had no one!"

"I was seven. I had less."

She flinched, and her hand flew to her chest.

"I was a girl myself," she said, quieter, turning to the room. "I was twenty-six, I had a baby I couldn't feed, and I was frightened."

"You had a job," Chester said from beside me, very low. "You told me so on our second date."

"That was after!"

"Then you had a job after, and a child you could have kept."

She ignored him and came at me.

"They told me you'd go to a good home," she said. "A family. The woman promised me, Annie. Do you think I'd have done it otherwise?"

"What was the woman's name?"

"I don't remember."

"What was the address?"

"There wasn't one."

"You were handing your daughter to a stranger, and you didn't ask for an address."

"I was in shock."

"You were counting," I said. "I remember the sound of the bills."

A woman at one of the front tables put her hand over her mouth.

"I thought you'd be adopted by someone kind," Colleen said, and her voice rose. "How was I supposed to know it would be a farm?"

"I told you what the farm was a minute ago. You didn't ask a single question about it."

Her mouth opened and closed.

"Then you can't say I didn't look for you!" she cried. "I have looked for twenty-seven years! I started a foundation!"

"Colleen," Wylie said.

He had come to the foot of the stage with the ledger under his arm.

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