Seventeen years ago, he left me while I was pregnant, all because his mother wouldn’t accept me. I raised our son alone in Manila, under the scorching sun and through torrential rains. That morning, in the crowded hallway of a Makati hospital, I never expected to run into that same woman—the one who had once looked at me like a stain on her family—now breaking down in tears.
“Child… is it really you?” she whispered, her voice choked. Before I could respond, she grabbed my hand: “I’m sorry… I’ve been searching for you all these years. I was wrong.”
A week ago, I might have felt relief hearing those words. But now, surrounded by the antiseptic smell and the hospital’s constant bustle, all I felt was a surge of anger. Instead of comfort, it was as if I was thrown back to the night I gave birth alone, with no one to hold my crying baby while I recovered.
“Why… are you looking for me?” I asked, keeping my voice steady, though the coldness in my eyes made her tremble.
“Because… your son… he regrets. He’s been searching for you… he’s very ill.”
I froze. After all these years of hiding, why now? And why must I—the one who had been abandoned—hear this?
She lowered her head, tears spilling onto my hand. “If you can… let me explain everything. Just this once.”
I reluctantly sat on a plastic chair in the hallway. The elderly woman sat beside me, shaky, wiping her tears, gathering strength to speak. Perhaps illness had weakened her, or perhaps the burden she carried had grown too heavy over the years.
“It wasn’t hatred,” she began, her words slow as if afraid I wouldn’t believe her. “I was wrong. But I was afraid… so afraid I couldn’t act differently. Afraid of losing my son, afraid of losing the family.”
She recounted the past: seventeen years ago, my son’s uncle—her own nephew—was embroiled in a failed business scandal, leaving the family on the edge of disgrace. Learning I was an outsider, unemployed, and pregnant, they saw me as a threat to the family’s reputation.
“My husband forced my son to leave you,” she admitted through tears. “He didn’t want to, but he was weak… like me. Neither of us had the courage to defy him.”
I sighed bitterly. “No reason justifies abandoning a pregnant woman.”
“Yes… yes,” she cried harder. “But then… things got worse. When my husband found out another girl in the neighborhood was pregnant by someone in the family, he forced my son to take responsibility for that child to settle everything.”
I was stunned. The man who abandoned me had been forced to care for another child not his own. Another life disrupted.
“When he learned you had given birth, he wanted to find you… but then… he had an accident. Broken bones, internal bleeding… a year in the hospital. When he woke… he had no memory of that time.”
A chill ran down my spine.
“He… forgot me?” I asked, my voice barely my own.
“Yes,” she sobbed. “I couldn’t tell him the truth. I feared he would leave the family again. I… I was selfish.”
I closed my eyes. Her words pulled me into a labyrinth of secrets and long-suppressed pain.
“And now?” I asked, trying to keep calm. “Why are you looking for me?”
She gripped my hand tightly. “Because he remembers now. He remembers everything. And he… he’s in the ICU. The doctors say there isn’t much time left.”
A heavy silence fell. The hospital’s announcements and footsteps blurred into the background.
“He wants to see you… just once. And… if possible… meet your son.”
My son. The child of him. A meeting I had never imagined.
That night, I lay awake. Nam, my son, noticed my restlessness and sat beside me.
“Mom, what’s wrong?” he asked, worried.
I looked at his face. Seventeen years of seeing him grow strong, smart, and kind—but now I saw traces of another man in his eyes.
I told him everything: about his father, about my mother-in-law, about the apology, and the secret kept for nearly two decades. Nam listened silently. When I finished, he asked simply:
“Do you want to see him?”
I replied slowly, “I don’t know.”
He placed a hand on my shoulder. “Then let your heart decide. I’ll go with you.”
The next day, we went to the hospital. My mother-in-law cried upon seeing us: “He looks just like him…”
I stepped into the ICU. He lay there, thin and frail, yet unmistakably familiar. I didn’t know whether to feel anger, love, or emptiness.
When I drew near, his eyelids fluttered. Then he opened his eyes.
Those eyes—the ones that once looked at me with love—were now full of remorse. He tried to reach for me, his voice hoarse:
“Are you… real?”
I nodded softly.
He cried. “I’m sorry… I remember now… everything… I’ve been searching for you… for years… but I couldn’t remember your name…”
I turned away, tears falling. “You abandoned me. You abandoned our child.”
“No,” he gasped. “I didn’t want to. My father… forced me. I thought… I would return… but the accident… I forgot everything…”
I stood frozen. Years of resentment softened like wet paper. But forgiveness was not immediate.
He looked at Nam, standing beside me. Eyes wide, astonished. “This… is my son?”
Nam stepped forward. “I’m Nam. Seventeen years ago, you weren’t there when I was born.”
He wept like a child. “I’m sorry… my son…”
The doctors announced visiting hours were over. Before I left, he held my hand, trembling:
“If there’s still time… I just hope… you won’t hate me anymore…”
That night, he passed away.
No chance for me to answer.
No chance to hold Nam with him one last time.
The funeral was quiet. No scandal, no rumors. Only our families, small and solemn.
My mother-in-law held my hand throughout, afraid to let go once more.
When it was over, Nam asked, “Mom… are you still angry?”
I looked at the gray Manila sky after the rain. I didn’t know if I had truly forgiven, but I knew one thing:
I let go.
Seventeen years of running… finally ended.
And I moved forward. With my son. With a heart lighter than before.