"Did you ever—" Emma's voice cracked. "Did you ever think about her? Like, when you were with me? When you were taking me to cello and stuff? Were you thinking about her?"
Natalie thought about lying. It would have been easy. She had been doing it for so long that the muscles for it were strong and supple and ready. She could feel them start to move.
"Sometimes," she said. "Not all the time. But sometimes. When you were born. When you took your first steps. On your first day of kindergarten, when you walked in without looking back, I sat in the car and cried, and I told your dad it was because you were growing up so fast. That was part of it. The other part was that I didn't get to see her first day of kindergarten. I didn't get to see any of her firsts."
Emma was crying now, silently, tears running down her cheeks and dripping off her chin onto the cream dress.
"Why didn't you want her?" she said.
"Oh, baby." Natalie reached out and then stopped, her hand in the air between them. "It wasn't that I didn't want her. I wanted her so much I couldn't breathe. I was twenty. I had no money. Her father left. My parents—" She shook her head. "I thought she would have a better life with Ruth and Martin. And I think she did, Emma. I think they were wonderful parents. That part I don't regret. The part I regret is what came after. That I promised I'd be there and then I wasn't."