“I’m still angry about some things.”
Daniel said, “He’d expect that.”
I turned.
“Do not interrupt my conversation with your father.”
“Sorry.”
Then the three of us laughed.
At a cemetery.
On the anniversary of his death.
Not because grief was gone.
Because it had changed enough to share space with something else.
Several weeks later, Mr. Bennett arrived at the Garden House.
This time, no limousine.
Just a dusty silver sedan.
He carried another envelope.
I stared at him.
“No.”
He laughed.
“This really is the final one.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Thomas ordered me to deliver it exactly one year after his death.”
Across the front, Thomas had written:
For Margaret, one year later.
I took it upstairs.
From my balcony, I could see residents in the garden.
Claire’s car was parked crookedly near the gate.
Daniel had left a ladder where I had told him not to.
