“So what? You’re going to destroy all of us over money?”
That question made something in me break.
I stood too.
“No, Derek. You destroyed yourselves over money.”
He pointed at me.
“You set us up with that million-dollar story.”
“No.”
I shook my head.
“I told you I received money.”
Then I looked at both of them.
“You showed me exactly who you were the second you thought there was more to take.”
Vivian started crying.
Not the quiet crying of someone who understood what she had done.
The angry crying of someone realizing she had lost control.
“What about me?” she demanded. “I’m your mother!”
I thought about Clara on her knees in the backyard.
Her shaved head.
Her broken sandals.
That bucket of dirty water.
Then I looked at Vivian.
“And she was my wife.”
For once, my mother had nothing to say.
Clara spent months in treatment.
It wasn’t easy.
There were difficult days.
There were days when she could barely eat.
Days when she was angry at me for not noticing sooner.
And she had every right to be.
I stopped asking her to forgive me quickly.
Instead, I stayed.
At appointments.
At home.
Beside her when she was afraid.
One evening, months later, I walked into the kitchen and found her standing by the window.
