“I am sorry,” she said.
“You did not forge my signature.”
“I raised her.”
“So did she.”
Evelyn looked through the foyer toward the dining room.
“That chandelier is beautiful.”
“My wife chose it.”
“She had good taste.”
“She did.”
Evelyn’s eyes moved to the oak tree outside.
“Lauren told me you were cruel.”
“I can be.”
“Not in the way she meant.”
She handed me a folder.
Inside were letters Lauren had written to her over the years. Most asked for money. Some described plans to move into the house. One included a sentence that made my stomach turn.
Once Dad is gone, Michael will finally understand that the house was always meant for us.
I closed the folder.
“Why give me this?”
“Because I kept believing the version of her that needed me. I want you to have the version I refused to see.”
I placed the folder on the sideboard.
“You can keep it.”
“I have kept enough.”
She looked at the dining room.
“May I sit here?”
I pulled out a chair.
She ran her fingers over the table where the deed had been torn.
“I remember when Lauren was six,” she said. “She spilled grape juice on my mother’s tablecloth. She blamed the dog.”
“Did you have a dog?”
“No.”
I laughed.
