“You do not understand the situation.”
“I understand it perfectly.”
“We were trying to secure her future,” my mother said.
“You called her a burden.”
Her eyes flicked toward Ben.
“He is the one who accepted money to marry her. You cannot be angry with us and excuse him.”
“You signed a contract to remove her from your lives,” I said. “Ben signed it to stop you.”
“That is not what happened,” my father snapped.
“Then explain Greenwood House.”
Silence.
People had begun slowing around us.
Nurses.
Families from the waiting room.
A volunteer near the reception desk.
My mother noticed them listening.
“This is not the place.”
“No,” I said. “The place was three years ago, when you decided your daughter was a problem to be managed.”
“We were thinking about you,” she whispered.
“I never asked you to sacrifice Rosie for me.”
“You would have spent your whole life responsible for her.”
“She is my sister. Loving her was never a sentence.”
My father stepped closer.
“We made a practical decision.”
“You made a cowardly one.”
