Chapter 532 Lust & Found:>20

• Then, towards the end of my junior year, we started having a rough time of it, family pressure on both sides, pressure at school, everything, and we began arguing, fighting, really, and things were said, stupid things, just said to hurt, and it all blew up at a party at a friend's house. This girl, I hardly knew her, I just used to see her around the campus, told me she'd slept with Joe the week before, that he was her guy now, and she was leaving there now to go and be with him again that night, and I was so hurt, angry, furious with him for doing some tramp and letting her talk about it, I did something stupid; I decided what was good for him was equally good for me, so I picked up a guy at the party and went for a drive with him up to the bluffs, and we made out in his car, although we did more than make out.
• A few weeks later, I found out I was pregnant. My mom was heartbroken; obviously I couldn't finish college. I was 20 and pregnant, no husband, no career waiting in the wings, the disgrace. My step-dad was more helpful, he asked the right questions, found out who the boy was from me, went to talk to him and got blown off by his family; they denied that he was the father, and refused to accept any responsibility for their son's actions.
• The only person who stood by me was Joe; I told him what I'd done, and he refused to leave me floundering. He proposed to me, asked to be the father of my baby, and I said yes. Your father was the best man in the world; Joey, it's a cliché, I know, but truly, they broke the mould when they made him, and I loved him more than anything; he claimed you for his own, gave you his name; he brought you up without ever once thinking you were ever anything other than his son; he may not have been your father, but he was your daddy, and I will always love him for that."