Luke understood.
“You have another mother.”
Clare looked toward him.
“That sounds like betrayal.”
“Of who?”
“My mom.”
“Evelyn?”
“Yes.”
Luke leaned back.
“You don’t have to decide how to describe anyone today.”
Clare stared at him.
That sentence seemed to help more than reassurance would have.
She looked again at Rachel.
“You loved her?”
Luke’s chest tightened.
“Yes.”
“How much?”
He almost smiled.
“That is a strange question.”
“I know.”
Luke looked at Rachel’s photograph.
“Enough that losing her changed the shape of every room in my house.”
Clare closed her eyes.
Then whispered:
“I should have answered.”
“You didn’t know.”
“What if the letters reached my office?”
“You still didn’t know.”
“What if somebody tried to tell me?”
Luke paused.
Clare looked at him sharply.
“What?”
“I don’t know.”
“You thought something.”
“My wife wrote three letters.”
“Yes.”
“She wasn’t careless.”
Clare’s expression changed.
Luke continued.
“She used certified mail for everything important.”
“How do you know?”
“Because she once sent a complaint about a dishwasher with signature confirmation.”
Clare almost smiled.
“She sounds difficult.”
“She was.”
“Good difficult?”
“Mostly.”
Luke looked at the envelope.
“If Rachel says none were answered, I believe none reached you.”
Clare thought.
Then picked up her phone.
She stared at it without dialing.
“Who are you calling?”
“My mother.”
Luke nodded.
Clare’s thumb hovered over the screen.
Then stopped.
“No.”
She put the phone down.
“I can’t.”
“You don’t have to.”
“I want to.”
“That isn’t the same as being ready.”
Clare looked at him.
“You say things like someone who has been to therapy.”
Luke smiled.
“Grief group.”
“Same effect.”
A knock came at the office door.
Luke’s eight-year-old daughter Mia stood there wearing a red school sweatshirt and carrying a backpack nearly as large as she was.
Mrs. Patterson from the grocery store waited behind her.
“Bus dropped her early.”
Luke checked the clock.
He had lost almost an hour.
“Thanks, Helen.”
Mrs. Patterson looked toward Clare.
Recognition appeared immediately.
She was too polite to say anything.
“I’ll leave you to it.”
Mia entered.
“Dad, Noah said Pluto isn’t a planet, but Mrs. Taylor says it’s a dwarf planet, and Noah says that means it’s basically a moon, which is stupid because moons orbit—”
She stopped.
Saw Clare crying.
Mia’s expression changed immediately.
“Are you okay?”
Clare stared.
Luke felt the air disappear from the room.
Mia had Rachel’s eyes.
Not similar.
Rachel’s.
Brown with the gold ring.
Same shape.
Same slight upward tilt at the corners.
Clare stood.
Slowly.
The photograph in her hand trembled.
Mia looked toward Luke.
“Dad?”
Luke had no idea how to explain any of this to an eight-year-old.
Not without talking to Clare first.
Not without understanding it himself.
He stood.
“This is Clare.”
Mia nodded politely.
“Hi.”