“Was she lying?”
“About a lot of things.”
“Is Grandma bad?”
There are questions adults ruin with simple answers.
I crouched beside him.
“Grandma did very bad things.”
“Does that mean she never loved you?”
I looked across the cemetery.
Wind moved through the trees.
“I think she loved me.”
Julian frowned.
“But she tried to hurt you.”
“Yes.”
“How can both be true?”
I thought of Deborah in the lakeside house.
The woman who planned my death.
The woman who pulled me from my coffin.
The woman who carried pills in her purse because she could not decide whether to save me or destroy me.
“Sometimes people use love as a word for wanting someone to belong to them.”
Julian listened carefully.
“Real love lets people belong to themselves.”
He nodded as if he understood.
Maybe children understand more than we think.
After a while, he said, “Can we get ice cream?”
“Yes.”
And just like that, death became boring.
Exactly as it should.
12. ONE YEAR LATER
On the first anniversary of my funeral, I held a party.
People thought the idea was strange.
I did not care.
I invited Dr.
Benson.
Mr.
Harlan.
Daniel Quade.
Thomas.
A few friends who had survived the scandal without turning my pain into entertainment.
And Julian.
Especially Julian.
There were no white lilies.
No tuberose.
No black clothes.
The cake said:
STILL HERE.
Thomas laughed so hard when he saw it that he had to sit down.
Julian insisted on lighting the candles.
There were thirty-eight.
“One for every year?” he asked.
“One for every year.”
“And next year thirty-nine?”
“Unfortunately.”
He grinned.
I had sold the house Preston and I shared.
I bought something smaller.
No grand staircase.
No impressive dining room.
No rooms designed to prove success to people I barely liked.
I started over.
Slowly.
Awkwardly.
Therapy taught me something revenge stories rarely admit:
Surviving is not the same as recovering.
For months, I could not drink anything someone else prepared.
I checked locks three times.
I woke suffocating from dreams of satin walls closing around me.
I panicked when elevators paused.
I avoided funerals.
I hated cinnamon.
Sometimes I still do.
But there were good things too.
I learned to sleep with the window open.
I learned silence is different when no one is hiding anything inside it.
I learned blood does not guarantee loyalty.
Marriage does not guarantee safety.
Apologies do not guarantee forgiveness.
And betrayal does not get the final word unless you hand it the pen.
Near sunset, everyone gathered around the cake.
Julian handed me the knife.
“Make a wish.”
I looked around the table.
My biological father sat near the window, telling Quade a story.
Dr.
Benson was arguing with Mr.
Harlan about coffee.
People laughed.
No one whispered about money.
No one waited for me to die.
I closed my eyes.
For a second, I was back inside the coffin.
I smelled flowers.
I felt satin beneath my hands.
I heard Preston’s voice.
