Chapter 11

“If only you had accepted your lot, Pennsylvania. If only you could have been satisfied with my arms and my affection. Now shame fills you,” my sister had told me.

I’d hung my head in sorrow and regret as she’d left with my laundry. I did again in front of Ewan, and closed my eyes too, to think of Judah, the man from my past, in an attempt to ignore the one inside my room. Though in my heart, I had given Judah up, in my head, I still wondered what became of him.

My thoughts were interrupted and suddenly Judah was gone as quickly as the white cloud from Ewan’s cigarette. When I looked, he had disappeared too, and his actions were at once the sole thing on my mind. Was he still on the property? The notion titillated me. The terror had waned and was now tempered with the prickling heat of my still-aroused state. If I was to be labeled some sort of simpleton with amoral proclivities, why, I inquired within, should I not relish them?