pressed my fingers against my lips.
“He called you?”
“Yes.”
“He asked whether I’d be willing to give her another chance.”
Emily paused.
“And then he said something I’ve never forgotten.”
“What?”
She looked directly at me.
“He said, ‘Sometimes the people who love us most are the ones who are most afraid of disappointing us.’”
My eyes filled.
That
sounded exactly like Robert.
Later that afternoon, Emily showed me a photograph.
It had been taken in a small restaurant five years earlier.
Susan sat on one side of a table.
Emily sat beside her.
And across from them was Robert.
He was smiling.
Healthy.
Alive.
I hadn’t seen that smile in eleven months.
I traced the edge of the photograph with my finger.
“Why was he there?”
Susan answered quietly.
“I asked him to come. I was so frightened I couldn’t walk into the restaurant alone.”
I looked at
