“No,” I said. “You were too selfish to explain.”
He closed his eyes.
Then nodded.
I walked away without hugging him.
But I didn’t leave angry.
That was new.
Valerie wrote to me once from prison.
The envelope came on a Thursday.
Grandma wanted to burn it.
Lily wanted to read it.
I opened it alone.
The letter was six pages.
She said she was sorry in the first paragraph.
By the second, she was explaining.
By the third, she was blaming Mom.
By the fourth, Grandma.
By the fifth, Dad.
By the sixth, me.
At the bottom, she wrote:
You took everything from me.
I turned the page over and wrote one sentence.
No, Valerie. We found what you hid.
Then I mailed it back.
I never heard from her again.
On the third anniversary of Mom’s death, we held a dinner in the backyard.
Grandma brought roses.
Lily brought a ridiculous chocolate cake.
Adrian came too, no longer just the lawyer but a family friend who had somehow been pulled into our orbit and never escaped.
Dad did not come.
Not because he wasn’t allowed.
Because he had asked, and I had said, “Not this year.”
He accepted that.
That mattered.
After dinner, Grandma gave me the black lacquer box from the wedding.
“I don’t want it,” I said.
“You should keep it.”
“Why?”