I didn’t need to switch the monitor on to verify that it was him. I’d know that voice anywhere. I pressed the button to let him in and then found myself in the bathroom, staring at my reflection to make sure I was presentable. I flattened my hair and then, scoffing at how ridiculous I was being, ran my hand through it again to muss it up.

I opened the door to let Riaan in and watched, amused, as Jezebel jumped all over him like he was a long-lost friend. “It’s too hot for coffee,” I surprised myself by saying. “Would you like a beer?” God knows, I needed one. He accepted the offer and we went outside to the patio. “How have you been? What’s new?” I asked, surprised that I was really interested and not just making conversation.

Riaan started speaking about the latest developments at the Gladysvale Cave site and how they’d found fossils of an extinct giant zebra. As he spoke, I thought about how sad it was that his wonderful scientific mind had been wasted on farmwork. It would have been fine if farming was his calling, but it wasn’t.

There was something to be said for duty, though. His giving up his own dreams so that he could be there for everyone else was very honorable and I wouldn’t have expected anything less of him. It was another reason I would never have come back to the farm pregnant; I knew that Riaan would have done the honorable thing.

The people I’d encountered during my aid work across Africa thought I was a supremely selfless person to give up having my own life so that I could improve the lives of others. Perhaps there were other aid workers for whom this was true but it never was for me. Dedicating my life to others was a purely selfish act on my part. I’d only done it to uphold my side of the deal I’d made with God.

I’ll do this for you, God, if you do that for me. I’ll dedicate my life to helping others if you protect my son.

I’d told myself that in keeping up my end of the bargain, I’d have to give up my own family and their needs entirely, but really it was shame and fear rather than sacrifice that kept me away. Shame for what I’d done—both in falling pregnant and leaving my son behind, as well as dropping out of the convent and breaking my mother’s heart—and fear of having to answer all their questions in the process.