Confessions from the Quilting Circle - Maisey Yates Page 0,102

could fix things that easily.

But they were living in a tangle of betrayal, and lies, largely created by her, and even if she had the power to make all this go away with a Band-Aid, she had taken that right from herself.

“Are you here to yell at me again? Because I’ll be honest, I deserve it.”

“No,” Anna said. “I came to talk. Not...accuse you of anything.” She bit her lip, and suddenly, tears filled her eyes. “I don’t know why it’s so easy for me to realize that things are complicated and have lots of sides to them when it’s me. But so difficult for me to see when it’s other people. Still. I keep thinking I’ve learned the lesson, but I haven’t. It’s also much harder, and more complicated than that. Then just knowing it. And I... Mom, I wanted to blame you for my unhappiness, because I wanted to blame anyone but myself. I went to see Thomas today, to blame him.”

“Oh,” Wendy said, her heart contracting with sympathy.

“And you know, he does have some of the blame. He married me, and he could never give me what a husband should. Talking with him today confirmed that. But I wasn’t brave. I wasn’t brave all on my own.”

Wendy’s heart contracted again as she watched her daughter, pale but determined, saying she wasn’t brave while she cut open her soul and let it bleed out.

“I used Michael to escape. I did think I might be falling in love with him, but I don’t think I was. I saw a hand being reached down to where I was in the pit, and I just wanted to take it rather than keep trying to climb out on my own.”

A tear slipped down her face and Wendy had to put her hand over her mouth to keep from interrupting. To keep from crying out.

She should have been that hand for Anna. But her fear, her stubbornness and her secrets had driven a wedge between them.

“I knew that Thomas wouldn’t be able to forgive me for cheating on him. I knew that it would end it. Because I wasn’t brave enough to say the words to him. I wasn’t brave enough to ask for a divorce. I made him be the one to do it. And then I was still looking for reasons why. When the reasons were just that we... We’re two people who don’t see love the same. Who don’t see marriage the same. And neither of us love the other enough to set down what we needed, what we wanted.”

“Come sit down,” Wendy said, making her way over to the stove and turning the heat on for the kettle. Anna followed, and sat down at the tiny table in the kitchen. There were two seats at that table, just the right size for an honest talk, for a breakdown. To heal. To mend.

“I’ve replayed what you said to me the night I told my secret over and over, Anna. And you’re right. I was protecting myself. I was protecting myself from the judgment of everyone else because I couldn’t bear any more of it. My mother was always so fearful of who I would become. Any mistake I made she blamed on blood. The weakness from my birth mother, and I began to wonder if she was right. When I got a good look at who I was and what I’d done, at the end of everything... I despised myself.”

She swallowed hard and pressed on. “But I did it to you. I was so afraid of the parts of you that looked like me. So afraid of what trouble your wild spirit would find for you. I hurt you more than I helped you. It’s a mother’s job to help her girls fly, not to clip their wings. I should have been the one to reach out and help you. You should never have had to be that desperate.”

“Mom...”

“I’m sorry,” Wendy said. “I’m so sorry.”

Anna stretched her arms across the table and hugged her, wordlessly, for a long, long time.

“I want forgiveness,” she whispered. Then she pulled away, wiping tears off her cheeks. “I want to forgive you and to forgive myself. I want you to forgive you. I keep thinking there has to be a way where you can admit that you did something wrong, but still forgive yourself completely. And I want to find it. That real forgiveness. I don’t want to live hating myself. I don’t want