“Yes.”
“And you still came after the way I spoke to you.”
I considered my answer.
“Part of me wanted you to find out.”
Dad nodded slowly.
“That part I understand.”
“But that isn’t why I came.”
“Then why?”
“Because Mom asked me last year to stop disappearing from the family whenever things became uncomfortable.”
His eyes lifted.
Our mother, Helen Bennett, had died eighteen months earlier after a brief illness.
She had been the quiet center of our family.
After her death, none of us had quite figured out where the center had gone.
Dad looked down.
“She knew, didn’t she?”
I hesitated.
“Knew what?”
“What you did.”
“Some of it.”
“How much?”
“More than you.”
The answer was honest.
He accepted it.
Then Ethan said softly, “Dad, why didn’t you ever ask?”
Dad looked at him.
“I did.”
“No,” Madison said.
“You asked questions you already thought you knew the answers to.”
