And for the first time Theo understood and accepted Julian’s desire to give birth in secret.
About time, Theo. Jesus Christ.
--personal aside--
I have some complicated feelings about this, but they are only tangentially related to what is going on in this book -- so, I'll put reading on hold for a second.
There is a tightly kept story -- I've only heard it once -- about the arrival to this world of my father's first child. As in the book here, the child was a girl.
By the account I was told: my dad arrived at the hospital after his daughter was already born. The mother of his partner was there to meet him at the front -- shouting over and over that the baby wasn't his. He was forcibly removed from the hospital.
And shortly after, he left the state (Oklahoma) to go back by his family (his mom in Indiana); where he started seeing my mom shortly there-after. My mom had a pregnancy early in their relationship, but she didn't carry it to term.
Four years later my sister was born -- and 18 months after that, I was born. My full sister looks very much like a shorter version of my (now acknowledged) half sister. Or at least that is what it seems from the photos. My mom and my sisters have made a trip down to see her (her name is Ashley). I have yet to do so.
