Now someone wanted them.
Every single one.
Robert mostly sat quietly.
For once, he understood that this wasn’t his moment to manage.
Amelia returned to her hotel that night.
She wasn’t ready to stay.
I didn’t ask her to.
Saturday arrived two days later.
The perfect surprise Robert had planned no longer existed.
But Amelia came anyway.
This time she walked to the front door.
She knocked.
And I answered.
Rebuilding what had been stolen from us wasn’t instant.
There were awkward pauses.
Questions without satisfying answers.
Moments when Amelia tilted her head or laughed in a certain way and I saw Claire so clearly that I had to look away.
But Amelia kept returning.
That mattered more than anything.
A few weeks later, she called just to ask whether I still had Claire’s pie recipe.
I read it to her over the phone.
Afterward, I sat alone in my kitchen and cried.
