“I’ve been waiting fifty-two years for this.”
-END OF Chapter 1–
Mrs. Parker did not open the envelope onstage.
That surprised everyone, especially Owen.
I saw it in the way he kept glancing at her as the audience slowly filed out of the auditorium.
Daniel Mercer didn’t pressure her.
He simply closed her fingers around the envelope and said, “It belongs to you.”
Mrs. Parker nodded.
Then she tucked it carefully into her purse.
On the drive home, Owen could barely contain himself.
“Fifty-two years,” he said from the back seat.
Mrs. Parker sat beside me in the passenger seat, watching streetlights slide across the windshield.
“That’s what I said.”
“How can you wait fifty-two years for a letter?”
She smiled faintly.
“You don’t.”
Owen frowned.
“You just live fifty-two years, and then sometimes the thing you stopped waiting for finds you anyway.”
That was the most Mrs. Parker would say.
