a photo of Rebecca laughing with the boys, she began to cry again.
“Does she know about me?”
“Not yet.”
“Will you tell her?”
I looked out at the street.
“She just buried her mother. I don’t know how to give her this, too.”
Anna was quiet for a moment.
“I understand that you’re afraid of hurting her.”
“What if this changes every memory she has of Carol?”
“It might change some of them.” She handed back my phone. “But those memories belong to her. She should be allowed to decide what they mean.”
I looked down at the letters between us.
My mother had decided what Anna could know. Carol had decided what I could bear.
I had been considering doing the same thing to Rebecca.
“You’re right,” I said.
PART 7: The Truth at the Kitchen Table
The following morning, I drove to Columbus.
