Sophia’s Point of View
“It’s a miracle,” The doctor beamed at me. “I’ve not seen anything like this in all my years of practicing. Congratulations, Mrs Prescott.”
A pang of pain hit my chest.
“It’s Miss Evergreen now.” I corrected him.
The new treatment had worked. Mom would still need to undergo intense monitoring and tests along with a month or two of physiotherapy to get her on her feet again.
But she was going to be fine. And it was all thanks to the deal I made with Reid. The deal had financed her treatment.
No, Sophia. Don’t think about him.
Mom was fine. I needed to focus on that. Just that and nothing else.
Mom was sitting upright when I entered the room, supported by her pillow and bed frame. She smiled when she saw me, her eyes crinkling slightly around the edges.
My lips wobbled as I smiled back at her.
“Hey.”
Mom’s smile widened and despite the fact that she looked pale and sickly, she’d never looked so beautiful.
“Hey, you.” She said and I just cracked.
I closed the distance between us and buried my head in her chest like I was still a child. And I cried.
I cried tears of joy that she was fine. I cried because Reid had shattered me and I wasn’t sure if I could recover. I cried for my children who I had failed before they were even born by bringing them into a broken family. And I cried for myself as selfish as that was.
Mom held me as she always had.
“It’s alright, it’s alright.” She whispered as she rocked me.
But it wasn’t. It wasn’t fine.
I wasn’t sure how long I cried but when I pulled away, Mom’s hospital gown had an obvious wet patch.
Mom didn’t seem to notice as she looked at me with obvious concern.
“Want to talk about it?” She asked.
My lips parted and my next words shocked even me.
“Are you my birth mother?”
Mom froze and I knew the answer to my question immediately.
Unbridled shock raced through me.
Mom ducked her head, averting her gaze from mine as she spoke.
“I’m sorry, Sophia. I-”
“Don’t say it,” I said, cutting her short. “You are my mom, now. That’s all that matters.”
I didn’t want to hear it. I didn’t need to. I suddenly wished I hadn’t asked her.
So what if she was my birth mom? She was still the woman that raised me and that was all that mattered.
Mom shook her head before raising her pale blue eyes to meet mine tearfully.
“Your father brought you home when you were a few months old. He said he found you abandoned on the streets,”
Her gaze went distant as though she was recalling the past.
“I suspected he might have been lying to me when we had to keep moving for the next couple of months but even then I couldn’t stand up to him.”
Mom’s cheeks were wet with tears now.
“When I lost my pregnancy after one of your Dad’s episodes, the doctors said I would never conceive again. So when he brought you… I wanted to keep you, Sophia. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
I reached out, wiping away her tears.
“Don’t be. I’m glad you were my mother.”
Our world might have been everything but rosy but Mom had loved me and protected me the best she could. She had placed my needs above hers every single time. She was my mother in the true sense of the world.
Mom embraced me and for some seconds we just held each other then Mom spoke dispelling the quiet.
“Your birth parents found you.”
It wasn’t a question.
I held on to Mom tighter.
“I’m not going with them.” I stated evenly.
But Mrs Terrence’s teary face flashed in my head alongside her emotional speech about how Father had abducted her months old daughter in an attempt to blackmail them for money.
How he had gone back on his word to return me the moment they paid him as a means to extort more money from them.
The Terrences had gone after him with the cops but Father successfully evaded them leaving them distraught.
I wondered if he would have revealed my identity to them later on if the Baxters hadn’t come for my hand in marriage when I was eighteen or if he would have maliciously kept the truth from them for springing the cops on him.
Mom stroked my hair but her words were straightforward and clear.
“They’ve been separated from you for the past twenty two years, I’m not sure any parent should have to go through something as painful as that.”
Mom had a point.
My hand drifted to my belly. I thought of my children who I had not even seen but had grown so attached to.
If I had them in my arms for months and someone took them from me, I would raze down the earth to get them back.
So did that make me a hypocrite for refusing to accept Mrs Terrence and for failing to tell Reid the children were his?
“You should get to know them at the very least,” Mom said, her soft voice cutting through my thoughts. “You might regret it if you don’t.”
I thought of that all the way to the cafeteria and back.
Getting to know my family. Or what would have been my family if Father hadn’t abducted me.
I already knew Mrs Terrence, my birth mother, was a snobby person who looked down on people she felt were beneath her social class.
Derek, who was supposed to be my older brother, seemed to be a good person. We didn’t have so much interaction after that day at the lobby but whenever we did, he had been courteous, polite and charming.
That meant Rita was supposed to be my sister in law. How trippy. She’d always gone out of her way to make me feel welcome alongside the squad and-
“Mrs Prescott, is it true you sued for a million dollar alimony?” Someone shoved a camera in my face and I froze in surprise.
“What?”