“Paige,” I said softly, “Mom worried about you every day.”
She laughed, but it broke halfway through.
“That’s not the same as being proud of me.”
“She was proud of you.”
“No, she was proud of you.” Paige’s voice sharpened, but the anger had no strength left. “Clara the responsible one. Clara the kind one. Clara who got good grades and sent money home and remembered birthdays and never needed anything. And I was just Paige. Too loud. Too emotional. Too much.”
I could have corrected her.
I could have listed every time she had hurt me.
My college graduation, when she announced her fake pregnancy just to pull the family away from me.
My thirtieth birthday dinner, when she flirted with my date until he left embarrassed.
Mom’s last hospital stay, when Paige vanished for nine days and then posted online about “losing the most important person in her life” like she had been there holding the morphine cup.
