For thirty years, I lived only for my son. I scrubbed floors, washed dishes, sorted mail – any work that would put food on our table. I wore the same winter coat for a decade because every extra penny went to his school clothes. That’s what mothers do.
My reward? Being dumped like trash on a lonely roadside.
It started when he met “her.” That cold-eyed woman who called me “old woman” behind my back. She convinced him I was a burden, that my love was manipulation. The boy who once promised me the world now sneered at my homemade meals.
“Mom, I’m taking you somewhere nice,” he lied that morning. The further we drove from town, the harder my heart pounded. When the car stopped in that barren wasteland, I knew. My own son was abandoning me.
I didn’t scream. Didn’t beg. Just stepped out into the dust as his taillights disappeared. If not for a second cousin’s kindness, I might have died there.
But life has a way of balancing scales. Exactly one month later, my son came to me weeping like a child. His precious wife? Ran off with his best friend. Cleared out their bank accounts too. The man who left his mother to rot was now homeless himself.
“Forgive me, Mama,” he sobbed at my feet. But after what he did, some wounds never heal.
