No, I didn’t love him at first.
I just didn’t see another way out.
I grew up moving from one foster family to another, and from a very young age I learned what it felt like to pack and be sent to the house of another stranger, hoping that maybe this time they would accept you.
My first husband, Ben, had also grown up in foster care.
Maybe that’s why we understood each other so fast.
We were not rich. I worked in a small shop and Ben was a mechanic. But we had a modest apartment, an old car and our daughter, Sophie.
That was enough for us.
Until Ben got sick.
After a year of fighting, I lost it.
I was left with medical debt, a one-year-old daughter and a life that I didn’t know how to keep in order.
I started working as a housekeeper in the mansion of an older, wealthy man
called William.
William was seventy-two years old, widowed and was completely alone.
I cleaned his house, made him breakfast and made the purchase.
But my salary was not enough.
When Sophie became ill, she could barely afford her medication.
Then my landlord gave me a month to leave because I had fallen behind on rent.
I remember being in William’s kitchen that night, crying in silence.
