There was nothing left to be said, so she simply stood there.

“Well? Aren’t you going to say something?” Her mother was livid.

Pregnancy wasn’t something her mother took to kindly, seeing as she had experienced nothing but heartache from her own pregnancy. Her boyfriend had left her early on, when he’d found out she was pregnant. Whether the child, who now stood before her, was his didn’t matter a lick to him; all that mattered was that he would not be saddled down with a baby. So, she had to raise her daughter single-handedly–and give up all her dreams and aspirations.

She could have given her daughter up for adoption or aborted her, but the life she felt in her womb, she could not deny; there was such a connection between her and that child, who now was pregnant with her own child. The sins of the fathers (and mothers), it seems, had been visited upon the child–yes, the child! Because the girl standing before her was barely sixteen–the same age she had been when she’d given birth to Alexandra.

No words would form in Alexandra’s mouth, as she looked wide-eyed at her mother, full well knowing that she had shamed her mother, who had had such great dreams for her: she was supposed to go to college and get a degree and get a high-paying job and make a lot of money and drag herself and her mother out of the shit hole they currently lived in. Now, she would maybe–just maybe–graduate high school, if only with a GED. But the child would take up her life now.

Alexandra burst into tears.

“Oh, now don’t go crying!” Her mother would have none of it.

But Alexandra couldn’t help herself, the tears just flowed, running down her cheeks in hot despair. Her chest was heaving, throbs of sobs convulsing in her small body.

“You’re sorry now?” Mom was about to let Alexandra have it. “What were you thinking? I mean, you had your whole life ahead of you! And you just had to go screw around? Tell me this–” Mom paused, “was it worth it?”

The tears burned hot against Alexandra’s soft skin and she nearly choked on them, as she swallowed the congestion collecting in her sinuses. Anger began to boil up within her chest and worked its way through her throat with a tight knot. She felt helpless and alone, ready to lash out in rage at her mother, who did not show her a shred of compassion.

“You want some compassion?” Mom was yelling. “I had compassion on you for the first sixteen years of your life! I could’ve–” she stammered, “I could’ve–I could’ve…” Now, Mom was a heap of tears on the floor, broken beyond recognition.

Alexandra did not know what to do.

Neither did her mother.

Both of them were islands, oceans apart, their tears flowing unsparingly with the heat of desperation and lonesomeness.