29Her words were simple, matter-of-fact, but carrying such a history of sadness, such weight of emotion that he almost believed he was listening to someone else. Never had he heard her speak so intimately, so openly. At the start, he squirmed in his chair, head down, trying not to catch her eyes, wishing he could make his excuses and leave. But as she spoke, he forgot she was his mother. She became like any other woman, one whose circumstances had torn her heart apart.
Some of the story, he had heard before, but he let her continue uninterrupted. For the most part, it differed little from the one Matthew had told, until she came to what happened after the two men in her life, her husband and her lover, had come to blows.
“Matthew's father,” she said, her voice quiet, self-conscious in a
