Chapter 8
Gwendolyn appealed again. From prison. She'd found a new lawyer — a public defender this time, because she had no money left. She claimed her first lawyer was incompetent. She claimed new evidence had emerged. She claimed — everything.
The appeal was denied. Again.
She would serve her full sentence. Six years. Maybe more, for the additional fraud charges that came later.
I got the letter from Karen on a Tuesday. I read it. I put it down. I didn't feel anything. Not relief. Not joy. Just — nothing. And that was good. Nothing meant she didn't have power over me anymore.
Chloe graduated from community college. Two years. Business degree. She got a job at a marketing firm. She moved into a better apartment. She called me, excited, to tell me.
"Paige," she said. "I got the job. I did it. I really did it."
I smiled. "I'm proud of you, Chloe."
She was quiet. Then she said, "Thank you. For not giving up on me. Even when I didn't deserve it."
"You did the work," I said. "I just gave you a phone number."
"No," she said. "You gave me a chance. That's more than anyone ever did. More than my own mother."
We didn't become best friends. We didn't become sisters. But we became — something. Something like family. Tentative. Careful. But real.
My father retired — for real this time. He moved into a small house near mine. He gardened. He volunteered at a food bank. He came over for dinner every Sunday. He and Elias got along like old friends.
One Sunday, he pulled me aside. "Paige," he said. "I want you to have something."
He handed me a small box. Inside, a ring. My mother's engagement ring. The one I thought Gwendolyn had sold.
"I found it," he said. "In Gwendolyn's safety deposit box. The police returned it to me. It's yours. It was always yours."
I put it on. It fit. I cried. He cried. Elias took a photo.
That photo — me, wearing my mother's ring, crying, my father beside me — went on the kitchen wall. Next to the scratch. Next to my mother's photo. Next to the house.
I looked at that wall sometimes. And I saw my whole life. The good. The bad. The painful. The beautiful. All of it. Mine.
Elias proposed that summer. On my porch. At sunset. With a ring he'd designed himself — simple, elegant, with a small sapphire, my mother's birthstone.
I said yes.
We had a small wedding. In the backyard. My father walked me down the aisle. Chloe was a bridesmaid — tentative, but trying. Elias's family was there. My friends. The house was full of flowers and laughter and love.
My mother's ring hung on a chain around my neck. She was there. In every flower. In every smile. In the cherry wood cabinet, glowing in the dining room.
May you like
I was happy. Truly, completely happy.
And I'd earned every bit of it.
