The years that followed blurred into survival.
I learned to juggle jobs, childcare, and night classes until exhaustion became part of me. By nineteen, I’d earned my GED. By twenty-three, I had my nursing license. And by twenty-eight, I had a modest but stable life in Nashville — not glamorous, but safe.
Still, on quiet nights, when I tucked Lily into bed, I sometimes wondered if my mother ever thought about me. About the granddaughter she had never met.
