When You're A Mom, You

And Before You Barrel Through Some Idiotic Cosmo Girl List Of How-well-do-you-know-your-man Questions, Let Me Say That I Don't Know Squat About Him Except That He Kisses Like A God And Screws Like A Devil.

I Know About Forgiving People And Loving Them Anyway, Even After They Hurt You.

He Was Afraid That The Secrets She'd Kept Would Always Be Here, Inside Him, An Ugly Malignant Thing Lodged Near Enough To His Heart To Upset Its Rhythm, And Though It Could Be Removed, Cut Out, There Would Always Be Scars; Bits And Pieces Of It Would Remain In His Blood, Making It Wrong Somehow, So That If He Accidentally Sliced His Skin Open, His Blood Would--for One Heartbeat--flow As Black As India Ink Before It Remembered That It Should Be Red.

Before This Trip And All That She'd Learned About The Three Of Them, She Would Have Gotten Angry Or Changed The Subject. Anything To Obscure The Pain She Felt. Now She Knew Better. You Carried Your Pain With You In Life. There Was No Outrunning It.

Maybe Time Didn't Heal Wounds Exactly, But It Gave You A Kind Of Armor, Or A New Perspective. A Way To Remember With A Smile Instead Of A Sob.