The blue ink stamp on my desk had dried, forcing me to press twice on every invoice when the hospital called. “Abigail, your mother has suffered a severe stroke,” Nurse Evelyn said. “You need to come immediately.” I hadn’t spoken to Martha in eleven years, not since leaving our family home on Oakridge Avenue.
At St. Jude Hospital, my mother lay beneath a white blanket, barely able to move. When she saw me, she grabbed my coat with her trembling left hand. “Abigail,” she whispered, “promise me you won’t abandon Gabriel.”
