Chapter 8: Five Minutes
Mei was standing when Eleanor came in.
She had changed out of what remained of the dress.
Someone — one of the bridesmaids — had found a plain ivory wrap and draped it around her shoulders.
She stood near the window with her arms at her sides and the jade pendant visible at her throat, rethreaded onto a simple chain that Daniel had found in his jacket pocket.
Daniel stood beside her.
Close enough to matter.
He did not look at his mother when she entered.
Eleanor stopped a few feet inside the door.
The room was small.
A side parlor, used for nothing in particular.
Two chairs.
A low table.
A mirror on the far wall in which Eleanor could see herself — and chose not to look.
**"Thank you for seeing me,"** Eleanor said.
Mei said nothing.
**"I know you don't owe me that,"** Eleanor continued.
**"I know you don't owe me anything."**
**"No,"** Mei said.
**"I don't."**
Eleanor's hands were clasped in front of her.
**"I want to explain—"**
**"I've read the letters,"** Mei said.
**"I know what happened.
I don't need your explanation."**
**"Then what do you need?"**
Mei looked at her steadily.
**"I need you to say it.
Out loud.
Not to the detective.
Not to Robert.
To me."**
Eleanor held her gaze.
**"I t00k you,"** she said.
**"I arranged for your mother to be told you had d*ed.
I had documents falsified.
I placed you with an agency and I made sure the trail was buried."** She paused.
**"I told myself I was giving you a better life.
I told myself your mother would recover.
I told myself many things."**
**"And now?"**
**"Now I know they were lies,"** Eleanor said.
**"All of them.
Lies I needed to believe so I could keep living with what I had done."**
The room was quiet.
**"My mother spent eleven years looking for me,"** Mei said.
**"I know."**
**"She d*ed not knowing if I was alive."**
**"I know."**
**"She wrote to you every year."**
**"I know."** Eleanor's voice had gone very thin.
**"I know that."**
**"Then why?"** Mei's voice didn't break.
It was almost worse that it didn't.
**"Why didn't you ever—"**
**"Because I was afraid,"** Eleanor said.
**"Because every letter she sent was proof of what I had done.
And I had spent so long pretending it hadn't happened that I couldn't—"** She stopped.
**"I couldn't let it be real."**
**"It was real,"** Mei said.
**"It was real for her every single day."**
Eleanor pressed her lips together.
Her eyes were bright.
She did not let what was behind them fall — not yet, perhaps not ever — but for the first time in this room, she looked like a woman who was genuinely inside her own consequence.
**"I know,"** she said.
**"I know that."**
Daniel had not moved.
He was watching his mother with an expression Mei had never seen on him before — not anger, not contempt, but a kind of careful distance.
The expression of someone who is deciding, in real time, what remains.
**"What do you want from this conversation?"** Mei asked.
**"Nothing,"** Eleanor said.
**"I don't expect anything from you.
I don't deserve anything from you."** She paused.
**"I wanted to look at you.
Properly.
Without trying to make you into something you weren't."** She looked at Mei — at her face, her posture, the pendant at her throat.
**"You look like her,"** she said quietly.
**"Around the eyes.
Lena.
You have her eyes."**
Something moved across Mei's face.
Too fast to name.
**"Did you know her?"** Mei asked.
**"Really know her?"**
**"Yes,"** Eleanor said.
**"She was — she was a good person.
She was warm.
She laughed easily."** A pause.
**"She deserved better than what I gave her."**
**"Yes,"** Mei said.
**"She did."**
The five minutes were nearly up.
Eleanor looked at Daniel.
**"I'm sorry,"** she said.
**"For all of it.
For what I did to her.
For what I made you into without telling you the truth.
For today."** She looked at the door.
**"I'll cooperate fully with the investigation.
I'll make a complete statement.
Whatever happens after that—"** She straightened slightly.
**"I'll accept it."**
Daniel looked at her for a long moment.
**"That's a start,"** he said.
Not warm.
Not forgiving.
But not closed, either.
Eleanor nodded once.
She turned toward the door.
**"Mrs.
Whitmore,"** Mei said.
Eleanor stopped.
**"Her grave,"** Mei said.
**"Do you know where she's buried?"**
Eleanor turned back.
**"Manchester.
A small cemetery on the north side.
St.
Clement's."** She paused.
**"I had flowers sent.
Every year.
Anonymously."** She looked at Mei.
**"It was the only thing I could do that didn't require me to admit what I had done.
I understand how that sounds."**
**"It sounds like guilt,"** Mei said.
**"Yes,"** Eleanor said.
**"That's exactly what it was."**
She left.
The door closed.
Mei stood at the window for a moment.
Then she reached up and touched the pendant at her throat — just briefly, just the tips of her fingers.
**"St.
Clement's,"** she said quietly.
**"We'll go,"** Daniel said.
**"Whenever you're ready."**
She turned to look at him.
**"I want to go tomorrow,"** she said.
**"Before anything else.
Before the lawyers, before the statements, before all of it."**
**"Then we'll go tomorrow."**
She nodded.
She looked at the door Eleanor had just walked through.
**"She sent flowers,"** Mei said.
More to herself than to him.
**"Yes."**
**"Every year."**
**"Yes."**
Mei was quiet for a moment.
**"That doesn't fix anything."**
**"No,"** Daniel said.
**"It doesn't."**
**"But it means she knew,"** Mei said.
**"The whole time.
She knew my mother was real.
She never fully let herself forget."**
**"No,"** Daniel said.
**"She didn't."**
Mei exhaled slowly.
She looked at the pendant one more time.
Then she looked at Daniel.
**"Let's go find Mr.
Howell,"** she said.
**"I want to hear everything he remembers about her.
Every detail.
What she laughed at.
What she was afraid of.
What she talked about."** She paused.
**"I want to know who she was."**
May you like
Daniel held out his hand.
She took it.
