She nodded slowly, then walked to the door. Before she left, she turned back.
“Thank you, Mom.”
I didn’t respond. I just watched her leave.
The next morning, I came downstairs to find all five daughters awake, sitting in the living room. None of them had slept.
I stood at the bottom of the stairs and looked at each of them.
“Night nineteen,” I said. “Six more nights.”
The morning after night nineteen, I called Naomi, Celeste, Violet, and Aurelia into the kitchen. Rosalind was still upstairs.
“I’m letting her stay,” I said.
Naomi’s face went pale. “Are you serious?”
“She tried to harm you, Mom,” Celeste said, her voice sharp. “How can you even—”
“Your father gave her a chance,” I interrupted. “And so am I.”
“That’s insane,” Naomi said. “What if she tries again?”
I looked at each of them.
“Then I suppose that’s a risk I’m willing to take.”
Celeste shook her head. “I don’t feel safe here.”
“Then leave,” I said quietly.
The room went silent. They all stared at me.
None of them moved, because leaving meant losing everything. One million each—and they knew it.
“I didn’t think so,” I said.
Living with someone you’re afraid of is exhausting. Living with someone you’re angry at is worse.
For the next five nights, the house felt like ice.
Rosalind stayed in her room most of the day. When she came down for the readings, her sisters wouldn’t look at her. They sat as far away from her as possible.
On night twenty, Violet got up and left the room after Warren opened the envelope. She didn’t come back until the reading was over.
On night twenty-one, Aurelia refused to sit on the same couch as Rosalind.
I watched it all and said nothing until the tension became unbearable.
“Your father didn’t write twenty-five letters so you could hate each other,” I said one night after the reading. “He wrote them so you could heal.”
Naomi looked at me. “She was going to hurt you, Mom. How are we supposed to just forget that?”
“I’m not asking you to forget,” I said. “I’m asking you to try.”
On night twenty-one, Warren opened the envelope addressed to Rosalind. Inside was a letter about a case she’d won when she was twenty-three.
A single mother fighting for custody of her daughter. Rosalind had worked for free, spent months on the case, and won.
Harrison’s words were simple.
“You fought for someone who couldn’t fight for herself. I believe you can become that person again.”
Rosalind cried, and for the first time since letter eighteen, her sisters didn’t look away.
On night twenty-two, Warren opened an envelope addressed to me. It was Harrison’s final letter to his wife—fifty-two years of love written in his shaky handwriting. He told me he was proud of me. He told me I’d been the strongest person he’d ever known. He told me he was sorry for leaving.
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