Unfortunate.
Not wrong. Not heartbreaking. Not inexcusable.
Unfortunate.
Across the room, Richard’s jaw tightened.
I closed my eyes for a second. When I opened them, I looked at Noah.
“He’s four weeks old,” I said. “Your grandson. He needed someone tonight. I needed someone.”
My mother’s voice softened in that careful way that had fooled me so many times.
“Claire, sweetheart, of course we care about Noah.”
I wanted to believe her. Some tired, tender part of me still wanted a mother to appear from inside my mother, one who would say she was sorry and mean it.
But Aunt Evelyn, standing quietly beside the bassinet, had tears in her eyes. Richard held the photograph like a witness. And my ribs hurt with every breath because a truck had hit my car and my father had still chosen champagne.
“Then why didn’t you come?” I asked.
