I Buried My Husband the Day My Daughter Was Born

After ten years together, Maggie believed Tom Henson would be a good father. But the day their daughter is born, he is nowhere near the delivery room. While she hemorrhages on the table, his assistant Elena Fox and his mother Jeanette Dickerson peel apples and talk about lunch, and Jeanette says the marriage was never registered, so Maggie is not his wife. In five days at the hospital, Tom never visits. Elena comes daily to report his schedule and to mock the baby's looks, sending photographs to Tom. When Maggie finally goes home, Tom is packing for an exhibition in the Capital, leaving with Elena. He pinches the baby's cheek, then asks Maggie why she smells so bad. Maggie has already decided: as her daughter's father, Tom died the day the child was born. She plans to leave, register the baby under her own name in Southport, and start over. But Elena's last look, fixed on Maggie's still-swollen belly, suggests the past is not finished with her yet.