Chapter 4: The Letter She Sent Before They Were Born
He made tea neither of us drank.
We sat at the kitchen table and he put his phone between us, face down, like it was something he might need to reach for quickly.
"Before the girls were born," he said, "my mother sent a letter.
To my dad's brother.
Uncle Garrett."
"I don't know Garrett."
"You've never met him.
He lives in Portland.
He and my dad have been close their whole lives." Daniel turned the phone over once, then back.
"She wrote to him and told him that if I had daughters — only daughters — the family property should bypass me entirely."
I looked at him.
"What property?"
"My grandfather's house.
The land it's on.
It's been in the family for three generations.
My dad always assumed it would come to me.
My mother apparently decided that wasn't acceptable if there was no male heir to carry the name forward."
"She tried to cut you out of an inheritance.
Before your children were even born."
"She tried to set the groundwork, yes.
Garrett showed my dad the letter two weeks ago." He finally picked up the phone.
Set it down again.
"That's what my dad said to her on the path.
He told her he'd seen the letter.
He told her he knew what she'd been trying to do."
I sat with that for a moment.
"And the property?"
"My dad is having his will revised.
He's cutting her out of any decisions about it entirely.
It goes to me regardless.
He made that clear to Garrett and to the family solicitor last week."
"So she lost."
"On that front, yes."
"But you still didn't tell me."
He looked at me steadily.
"No.
I didn't."
"Why?"
"Because I was ashamed of her," he said.
"Because I didn't want you to know that the woman who raised me spent the last three years trying to undermine you, undermine our family, and position herself to punish us if we had daughters.
I didn't want you to look at me and see her."
The teacups sat between us, untouched and cooling.
"I don't see her when I look at you," I said.
"I know that now."
"But I needed to know this.
I had a right to know this."
"Yes," he said.
"You did.
I was wrong."
My sister called at nine-fifteen.
I let it ring.
She called again at nine-twenty.
I picked up on the third call.
"I need to tell you something," she said, before I could speak.
"About Daniel's mother.
About something she said to Mum at the hospital — the day after you delivered."
May you like
I looked at Daniel across the table.
"Tell me," I said.
