Sometimes he looks at her and doesn’t know what he’s seeing. This woman that is his only family. She is as alien to him as the moon, and seemingly just as distant.

Except sometimes she gave him an extra biscuit at dinner. Or she would lay her hand on his shoulder, and her touch would be gentle instead of the weighty claw he would have expected. She washed his clothes and fed him three times a day.

He didn’t understand her. This woman that was supposed to be his family. This stranger that had a slight resemblance to his mother.

He didn’t know her. But he wanted to.