"Mom?" Lily asked quietly, and my heart shattered.
I went to the funeral to give you the rabbit, but when I saw you standing next to the caskets, crying, I couldn't do it. What do you say?
I told myself I'd wait until the hurt wasn't so fresh. But as time passed, it became harder to keep my promise.
Then you walked into my hospital room.
"Make sure Mr. Bunny gets home to my mommy,"
He hadn't placed my face at first. But my name and my stories about my family had done the rest.
I should've told you then, but I couldn't. I kept waiting for a perfect moment until my illness made sure there wouldn't be one. I hid the box and asked Lily to wait a year so you could have time to become a family.
I'm sorry I failed your daughter's promise.
I folded the letter very carefully, the way you handle something so you don't throw it.
I failed
Then the grief turned. I felt it happen, the way you feel a car shift gears.
He knew.
He knew who I was every single day. He knew what that rabbit was worth to me. He married me with Mr. Bunny sitting in a box somewhere in the same house.
Then he died and passed the burden of his promise to Lily... someone innocent, and the one person I could never allow my grief and anger to touch in this moment.
Then the grief turned.
Daniel picked the one person on earth I couldn't be angry at and put the truth in her hands.
Coward. That's what I thought. Coward.
And there were things I'd never get to ask. Was Josie scared? Did she call for me?
He was gone. There would never be a fight, or an apology I could throw back in his face. Only a rabbit that didn't even smell like my Josie anymore.
Coward.
"Are you mad at Dad?"
Lily's voice was tiny. She was sitting on the floor with her knees pulled up.
Could I lie to her? I'd like to tell you I could have. But she deserved honesty, and I was too tired to do anything else.
"Yes," I said. "I am. But listen to me. None of this is your fault. Not one bit of it."
Her chin wobbled anyway. And then she asked the question she'd probably been holding for days.
