Then I remembered how she'd cried in my arms.
Maybe she'd tried to tell me.
Maybe I'd been too busy promising everything would be fine to hear what she was asking.
Her mother slid the envelope across the table.
"She wrote this for me. She said I could show you if anything ever happened to her. I couldn't bring myself to do it until now."
"What was she afraid of?"
Her mother pushed the envelope toward me.
"Read it."
I unfolded the paper.
Mary's handwriting.
The little hearts she sometimes drew above her letters.
I touched the page before reading.
"Mom,"
"I know you loved me."
"I know that now."
"But when I was little, I thought you would have traded every day with me to have Dad back."
"I know you never meant that."
"Still, I spent years trying to be quiet enough not to make you sad."
"Now I'm going to have two daughters."
"I already love them more than I know how to say."
