Chapter 7 - The Birthday Girl
I drove to Melissa’s apartment the next afternoon.
Not because she asked.
Because I needed to see her face when I asked one question.
She opened the door in sweatpants, without makeup, her engagement ring still glittering beneath the hallway light.
“Why are you here?”
“Did you know?”
Her face changed.
“Know what?”
“About the document Dad submitted.”
She looked away.
That was enough.
“How much did you know?”
“Claire, come inside.”
“No.”
I remained in the doorway.
“How much?”
She wrapped her arms around herself.
“Dad said there was paperwork that could help temporarily.”
“Paperwork carrying my forged signature.”
“I didn’t know he forged anything.”
“But you knew he was trying to access my settlement.”
She began crying.
“I told him not to.”
“When?”
Her silence answered.
“Before or after the headline?”
“Before.”
I felt my stomach turn.
So the calls had not started because of the article.
The article had only made them panic.
They had already been circling.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because everything was falling apart.”
“My family had already fallen apart.”
“I know.”
“Stop saying that.”
I surprised both of us with the sharpness of my voice.
“You don’t know.”
She wiped her eyes.
“You think I don’t feel guilty about the funeral?”
I froze.
“Why should you?”
Melissa stared at the floor.
Then she whispered, “Because Dad wanted to go.”
For several seconds, I could not understand the sentence.
“What?”
“He wanted to go to the funeral.”
I almost smiled because it sounded impossible.
“He told me he couldn’t come.”
Melissa covered her mouth.
“Mom wanted to go too.”
Something inside me began pounding.
“Then why didn’t they?”
She looked at me.
It was the first time I had ever seen genuine shame on my sister’s face.
“Because I asked them not to.”
The hallway seemed to tilt.
“What did you say?”
“My birthday dinner had been planned for months.”
“Three funerals were not planned.”
“I know.”
“You told them not to bury their grandchildren?”
“I was angry.”
“At whom?”
“You.”
I actually stepped backward.
Melissa’s tears fell faster.
“You had called that morning.”
“Everybody was crying.”
“Everything became about you.”
“My husband and children had just died.”
“I know how it sounds.”
“It sounds exactly like what it was.”
She shook her head.
“I thought they would go to the funeral and everyone would forget my birthday.”
I stared at the woman standing in front of me.
Thirty years old.
Not twelve.
Not a child.
A grown woman who had looked at three deaths and worried they might ruin her dinner.
Then Melissa said something even worse.
“Mom told the relatives you wanted the funeral private.”
My breath stopped.
“What?”
“She said it would prevent drama.”
That was why my side of the church had been empty.
Not because everyone had chosen Melissa.
Some had never been told the truth.
May you like
For six months, I had been grieving an abandonment larger than the one that had actually happened.
And my mother had manufactured it.
