He looked smaller without my mother beside him.
“Can I come in?” he asked.
I nodded.
He placed the flowers on the windowsill.
For a while, he said nothing.
Then, “I’m sorry, Jessie.”
The old me would have rushed to comfort him.
It’s okay.
You did your best.
Don’t feel bad.
The new me lay still.
“For what?” I asked.
He swallowed.
“All of it.”
“That’s broad.”
He winced.
“I knew there was money.”
My chest tightened.
“I didn’t know how much at first. Elaine said Sam left a little something. She said we needed it for diapers, rent, medical bills. Then later, when the statements came, she said it was complicated. She said she was saving you from becoming spoiled.”
“Spoiled.”
My voice was flat.
Hank looked at the floor.
“I should have told you.”
“Yes.”
“I was afraid.”
“Of Mom?”
“Of losing the family.”
I looked at him then. Really looked.
Hank Pierce was not a cruel man in the obvious ways. He did not scream. He did not hit. He did not scheme with my mother’s precision.
He simply stood by while harm happened, then called his stillness peacekeeping.
“You didn’t lose the family,” I said. “You traded me for it.”
His face crumpled.
I felt pity. It rose out of habit.
Then I let it pass without acting on it.
“I can tell the lawyer what I know,” he said.
“Will you?”
He nodded.
“Even if Mom hates you?”
His eyes filled.
“I think she already does.”
That was the first honest thing I had ever heard him say about his marriage.
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