“She lost Kathy too.”
“She lost a friend. I lost my mother.”
Dad looked exhausted.
“I can’t do this tonight.”
That was the moment I realized I could no longer count on him to protect the things that mattered to me.
Two weeks before prom, one of Mom’s handmade flowers came loose from the neckline.
I cried harder than the damage deserved because it felt like another piece of her was disappearing.
Gary drove me to an alteration shop owned by Mrs. Howard.
When I explained that my mother had made the dress before she died, Mrs. Howard promised to be extremely careful.
Then, while examining the stitching, she suddenly became quiet.
“Has anyone else brought this dress here?”
“No.”
“Maybe photographs of it?”
My stomach tightened.
Mrs. Howard explained that a woman had come into her shop a month earlier carrying detailed photographs of a dress almost identical to mine.
