I caught her once standing next to Mom’s graduation dress, with the dress bag partially open.
What are you doing?
“Reviewing if there are moths.
In my closet?
He looked at the dress.
Your mother wouldn’t want her work destroyed.
Don’t talk about my mother.
Her smile changed.
“You really think you’re kind of a little replacement for her, right?
I ordered him to come out.
That night, I told Dad what had happened.
Instead of defending me, he said that Shirley was trying to help.
She also lost Kathy.
She lost a friend. I lost my mother.
Dad looked exhausted.
I can’t with this tonight.
That was the moment when I realized that I could no longer count on him to protect the things I cared about.
Two weeks before graduation, one of the handmade flowers by mom was released from the neckline.
I cried more than the damage deserved, because I felt another part of it disappear.
Gary took me to an arrangement store run by Mrs. Howard.
When I explained that my mother had made the dress before she died, Mrs. Howard promised to be very careful.
Then, as he examined the stitches, he suddenly fell silent.
Has anyone else brought this dress here?
“No.
Perhaps photographs?
My stomach tightened.
Mrs. Howard explained that a woman had gone to her store a month earlier with detailed photographs of a dress almost identical to mine.
I wanted an exact copy finished before graduation.
Mrs. Howard refused.
“What was it like?” Gary asked.
“Tall. Blonde. About forty-five years. Expensive bag. Very impatient.
I didn’t need to say the name Shirley.
We all knew.
Then Mrs. Howard lifted the inner lining of Mom’s dress.
With tiny blue thread there was only one letter.
K.
Kathy.
Mom had signed her job.
I played the little blue print and cried.
Now I knew what Shirley had been planning.
But I had no idea how cruel he pretended to be.
—
# PART 2 — THE NIGHT HE TRIED TO DELETE MOM
The night of graduation arrived.
I almost stayed at home.
Instead, I stood in front of the mirror in my room in Mom’s powdery pink dress.
For a moment, I saw his face in mine.
Then I touched the blue K hidden inside the lining.
I won’t disappear, Mom.
