Chapter 3 - A Promise Is a Promise
I did not speak at first.
My mother did not notice.
“Your sister is furious,” she continued. “Everett said he was going to help pay part of the venue, and there’s still money owed. I need you to transfer it right now.”
I stared through my fogged-up windshield at the cemetery gates.
“Mom,” I said slowly, “I just came from my husband’s funeral.”
“Yes, sweetheart, I know. It’s very sad. But we can’t embarrass ourselves in front of everyone. Penelope invited half the city.”
The steering wheel felt cold beneath my fingers.
“Everett is dead.”
“I understand that,” she said, with the irritated patience of a woman discussing a delayed delivery. “But he promised to help. A promise is a promise.”
That sentence broke the last thread.
Not because it was cruel.
Because it was familiar.
My family had always treated my pain as an inconvenience if it did not produce something for them. When I got promoted, they asked if I could pay for Penelope’s vacation. When Everett and I bought our first house, my mother asked whether we had “extra” furniture for my cousin. When Everett got sick, they visited twice—once to take photos, once to ask whether he still planned to contribute to Penelope’s party.
Everett had been kind to them because he believed kindness could teach people how to be better.
It never did.
I hung up.
Then I blocked my mother’s number.
For several minutes, I sat in the cemetery parking lot while rain dotted the windshield. My dress smelled like lilies and wet soil. My hand rested on the passenger seat where Everett’s jacket should have been.
That would be the last time my family used my grief to collect something from me.
May you like
But Everett had already known them better than I wanted to admit.
And he had prepared one last answer.
