Dad looked away.
“Every time, I promise myself I’ll give it to you afterward.”
“And every time you don’t.”
“No.”
I tore it open. There was only one page.
“If you are reading this, I finally ran out of excuses.”
“I loved your mother.”
“I still love her.”
“But loving her has become the reason I am afraid to live.”
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“I kept telling myself loyalty meant obeying her last wishes.”
“The truth is, obedience was easier than choosing something she could no longer forgive me for.”
“And if Helen ever sits across from me again, I don’t know what I will choose.”
Dad was crying. So I asked the question neither of them had asked in years.
“Helen, why did you come here last night?”
She looked at Dad. “He called me.”
Dad whispered, “I asked her to dinner.”
“And you canceled seeing him again.”
Helen nodded.
“Why?”
She looked at Mom’s scratched-out face beside hers. “Because I heard Maggie’s voice saying I was taking her place.”
I took the photograph.
Both of them looked at me.
“No. You don’t get to do this anymore.”
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Dad frowned. “Rachel.”
„Nie możesz umawiać się z kobietami, które mama akceptowała, bo boisz się tej, której nie akceptowała. A Helen, nie możesz ciągle odchodzić, bo umierająca kobieta poprosiła cię, żebyś zniknęła”.
Żadne z nich się nie odezwało.
Wskazałem na dwa puste krzesła.
“Siedzieć.”
Helen prawie się uśmiechnęła. „Teraz nam rozkazujesz?”
„Najwyraźniej ktoś musi.”
Tata na nią spojrzał.
Po raz pierwszy odkąd przybyłem, obejrzała się.
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