MOM SAYS NICE HOUSES AREN’T ABOUT MONEY.
THEY’RE ABOUT WHO LETS YOU FEEL SAFE INSIDE THEM.
I stared at it.
“I kept this for eight years,” Margaret said.
My eyes filled.
“Why?”
“Because Willa drew three people.”
I looked again.
Me.
Willa.
Margaret.
“She had known you ten minutes.”
Margaret nodded.
“She saw something before either of us did.”
“What?”
“That you were not meant to walk through my house and disappear.”
My throat tightened.
Margaret reached for my hand.
“I thought bringing you into my life was my chance to repair Harold’s sins.”
She shook her head.
“But eventually I realized that wasn’t what happened.”
“What happened?”
Her eyes filled with tears.
“You repaired us.”
I looked at Rose’s photograph.
At Willa’s childish drawing.
At Margaret.
And for the first time, the story no longer felt like Harold’s.
That was the final surprise.
For years, we had
