For once, I was grateful that my brother's wife could think clearly while I was barely holding myself together.
I called Mara from my hospital bed and apologized before I could even explain what had arrived that morning.
She said the envelope had come from her, delivered to reception by a friend after she learned which ward I occupied.
Mara told me she had kept the correspondence because Sadie eventually asked why her aunt never answered birthday invitations.
She hadn't wanted to show a child those cruel words, but she also couldn't invent an explanation for years of absence.
I told her I had never seen the invitations or written that reply, and her breathing became suddenly uneven.
Mara asked me to repeat the date printed at the bottom, then went silent when she heard my answer.
That week, I had been recovering from emergency surgery after my son's birth, barely able to get downstairs without help.
