About ten minutes later, the door opened.
My mother came out first.
Her eyes were slightly red, but her expression was calm.
My father followed, looking satisfied.
"Let's go," my mother said to me. "Home."
My father patted her back. "I've got a dinner tonight. Don't wait up."
My mother nodded. "Don't drink too much."
On the way downstairs, she held my hand the entire time.
Her palm was cold.
When we got home, she went straight to the kitchen.
She started cooking.
I stood in the doorway, watching her.
"Mom."
"Hmm?"
"What about Grandpa and Grandma?"
She kept chopping vegetables. She didn't answer.
At dinner, she kept piling food onto my plate.
"Eat more," she said. "You've gotten thin."
The next afternoon, a lawyer came to the house.
My mother talked with him for a long time.
After he left, she sat on the couch, staring at nothing.
"When your father and I first started out," she said suddenly, "he couldn't even afford to buy me flowers."
I sat down beside her.
"It was your grandfather who helped him." She gave a small smile. "Now he's rich."
She didn't finish the thought.
But from that day on, something in my mother shifted.
She started putting herself together—new clothes, careful makeup.
She was warmer toward my father, more attentive.
He was pleased. He even started coming home more often.
Only I knew that the spark in my mother's eyes was burning brighter than ever.
She found Grandpa Abbott's old coat and sat down to sew the buttons back on, one by one.
I'd never seen her so focused.
Each stitch was tight and precise, like she was performing some kind of ritual. When she reached the last button, she paused. With the tip of her scissors, she carefully pried open a corner of the lining.
Inside was a silver recording pen. Old, well-worn.
Mom held it in her palm and pressed it against her cheek.
Then she tucked it into the turtleneck of her sweater.
"Lori," she whispered, "Grandpa's last words are right here."
Dad came home early that night.
He walked straight to Mom, his expression off.
"Were you in my study?"
Mom was arranging flowers. Her hand flinched.
A rose thorn pierced her fingertip. A bead of blood welled up.
"No." Her voice was barely there.
Dad stared at her turtleneck for a few seconds.
Then he grabbed her collar and yanked.
Mom stumbled backward. The recording pen clattered onto the floor.
"What is this?" He snatched it up.
The color drained from her face. She lunged for it.