I made my way to the spare bedroom and crawled under the covers, not even bothering to take off my clothes. I snuggled way down, pulled the comforter over my head and cried. I cried for my pride. I cried for the girl of my past. My future. Oakley’s future. I choked on sobs as exhaustion took over. I was so wrapped up in my own sadness that I didn’t hear the bedroom door open. It wasn’t until the mattress dipped beside me and Mom snuggled under the covers that I realized I wasn’t alone.

“Baby, talk to me,” she said, wiping at my face. “You can’t keep beating yourself up for one mistake. At some point, you’ve got to forgive yourself.”

“I just am so embarrassed.”

“Have I ever told you my most embarrassing story?” Mom asked, nuzzling deeper into the mattress.

“The time your dress fell completely off in a public park?” I asked dryly.

“No.”

“The time your phone started going off during a parent teacher meeting and your ringtone was ‘My Neck, My Back’ by Khia?” I offered again.

“No. But that one is up there,” Mom replied with a laugh.

“The time you bought a stripper pole for your bedroom to spice things up with Dad, and you broke your arm and knocked yourself out while practicing alone, and the paramedics found you in your neon stripper gear?” I rushed out on a single breath. This was a more recent story.

“No—can you please stop guessing so I can spit some wisdom?”

I cracked a smile. “Sure.”

Mom let out a sigh before responding. “When I was in high school, I got dared to flash the hot soccer coach. He was Brazilian, baby. Brazilian men are just a different league of sexy,” she said dreamily.

I blanched. “Did you do it?”

“Yes. But I didn’t realize we had an audience. Half the soccer team saw me, and I got expelled. It completely derailed my graduation plans. I ended up taking an extra semester. It was so incredibly stupid, and not only did I get in trouble, he was fired. It was a different time. People thought he was encouraging the attention of his students. I ruined his career.”

Wow. That was awful. I couldn’t imagine doing that. “What did you do?” I asked.

“I did what I had to. I moved on. I felt guilty. But at the end of the day, we all make mistakes. And I have it on good authority that he’s now a successful coach for the International Soccer League. Sometimes, things have a way of working out. We can’t give our mistakes all our energy forever. I’ll always regret what happened, but I’m not the same stupid seventeen-year-old I was. And you aren’t the same girl anymore, either.”