Winter In August by Mia Villano

with me. Running away was the only way she knew how to escape. She didn’t want to hurt him or you and believe me, I know what she did wasn’t right, but she was embarrassed. Twenty years ago, this lifestyle wasn’t accepted like it is now.”
    I sat there and was in shock. All the years I missed her and wondered where she was and she had been living right there. My dad came here to find her and he said she wasn’t here. Did he know?
    “What are you talking about, Annie? My dad said he came to the cottages and she wasn’t here.”
    “She was. I remember when he came. I told him she wasn’t here. It was a horrible thing for me to do, but she begged me. I didn’t want her to leave me. I don’t know if you remember the first time you two stayed here. She was very depressed and said she drove for eight hours from Ohio, and her car brought her here. She stayed for a week, and we fell in love. She was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. I was in a long-term relationship with a woman that was pretty rocky, to say the least. I loved her and planned on spending the rest of my life with her. Then your mom walked in here, and my heart stopped. My life changed when you two came here. I fell in love with her and she with me. She would come here a couple of times a year and bring you using the excuse she needed to get away. Each time she visited we became more in love. What we felt was something we couldn’t explain. When she was gone she was miserable and so was I. We would talk on the phone all the time, and our relationship became serious.”
    I sat there and listened. My mom and Annie’s time together was all making sense to me now. My mom in the bathroom at home on the phone, laughing, crying, whispering. My dad and her yelling when she would hang up.
    “The last time she came here she was alone. We had the most wonderful week of my entire life when she decided she wanted to spend her life with me. She was so upset, Gabby. I told her to bring you and she kept saying she didn’t want to take you from your dad.” Annie squeezed the spot on her nose between her eyes. She looked at me.
    “She loved you but was embarrassed about loving a woman. I know how she behaved was not right, and believe me, I let her know. I was so smitten with her, I was willing to go along with anything to have her with me.”
    “Why didn’t she tell me? I’m older now, I can handle pretty much anything.” I was crying again. The tears were cleansing my soul realizing I had cried more in the last couple of days than I had my whole life.
    “Your mom thought you hated her and you would not forgive her for this.”
    I stared at the face of the woman responsible for taking my mom from me. I wanted to hate her and feel sorry for her at the same time.
    “Come on, Annie. I’m as opened minded as the next person. I’ve not been with a woman and that’s not my thing, but I’m not one to judge anyone for who they love, especially my mother.”
    “She didn’t know that, Gabriella. She thought you would be so mad at her for abandoning you.
    I wiped my eyes. “Why didn’t she try?”
    “I don’t know. That’s something you’re going to have to ask her.”
    “Ask her? How would you suggest I do that? She hasn’t contacted me since she walked out when I was eight years old. Oh wait, she contacted me once in the nineteen years she was gone. One time she wrote me a note to tell me she would keep in touch.” Annie sat silent, looking away from me.
    “That letter was from me. I wrote that letter to you.” My head jerked to attention.
    “What do you mean, you wrote it?” I was stunned. I had kept that letter in my nightstand and would read it every night for years.
    “I felt horrible about what she did and I decided to write you a letter pretending to be her. I didn’t even think you would receive it. I wanted to ease my guilt and give you some peace.”
    More lies and empty promises. What more could my heart endure? My mother didn’t