Chapter 2
That day, I stayed in the hospital for a while and then insisted on being discharged.
I insisted to the doctor that my husband and child had already died. I didn’t know Geovanni and Warren, but I still remembered everything else.
The doctor told Geovanni that I probably had a temporary amnesia caused by a concussion, and maybe I would never remember, or maybe I would remember the next day.
Geovanni and Warren had relaxed expressions on their faces, they looked extremely happy. After meeting me once, they had been rooted in Marilyn’s ward ever since.
The day I was discharged from the hospital, it was the kind–hearted nurse who saw me off. She seemed very worried about me.
She hesitated for a long time, and finally struggled to speak before I got in the car, “Ms. Stanley… are Mr. Duncan and Warren, are they your family? They have been accompanying Marilyn these days, maybe you should pay attention.”
When Geovanni and his father were talking to the doctor, the young nurse listened for a while, and
now her face was full of sympathy towards me.
I silently thanked her kindness in my heart, and then firmly said, “It’s impossible. My husband and
child had already died, they died in a big fire. Geovanni and Warren are just strangers to me.”
After I finished speaking, I got in the car, but my thoughts drifted back to the big fire three years
ago.
I will always remember that day when I lost the baby in my belly and also lost the right to be a
mother.
That day, I had just found out that I was pregnant and was about to tell Geovanni the good news. However, Geovanni came back drunk and when he saw me, he started mocking me, saying that I didn’t know my place and that I was just like a morning glory clinging onto him.
And Warren fell ill again. I took care of the patient and the drunkard, busy and overwhelmed. I made a bowl of sobering soup for Geovanni and coaxed him to drink it before wholeheartedly taking care of Warren. After much effort, I managed to improve Warren’s condition slightly. Being pregnant, I couldn’t hold on any longer and dozed off by the bedside.
So I ignored the dynamics on Geovanni’s side.
He didn’t know where he got the paper money from, and he burned the paper money in the living room, then fell into a deep sleep.
But he didn’t completely extinguish the fire, and the remaining embers ignited the house. By the time I discovered it, a big fire had already started in the house.
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I carried Warren and dragged the heavily intoxicated Geovanni away from the fire. I protected them well, but my cheeks were burned by the flames. In my fear, I also suffered a miscarriage, which deprived me of the right to be a mother.
But afterwards, Geovanni blamed me for not paying attention. At that time, I deeply loved Geovanni, and when he asked me with a furrowed brow, I felt immense self–blame, taking all the blame upon myself… If only I had stayed alert back then.
Since that day, they looked at me with disgust, seeing the incurable grotesque wound on my face, their eyes filled with contempt.
