Yet Ethan never changed the way he treated people.
He still bought flowers from the grocery store.
He still helped neighbors with their cars.
He still came home and asked me how my day had gone before talking about his own.
And when Mom gradually became friendlier, he welcomed her without demanding an apology.
She started attending Sunday dinners again.
She asked about his shops.
She even sent him a birthday card with a handwritten message inside.
I thought the worst was behind us.
I thought she had finally accepted him.
I didn’t know that Ethan had been carrying a secret since before our wedding, or that my mother’s apparent change of heart had come years too late to erase what she’d done.
Last spring, we bought our first house near downtown.
It wasn’t enormous, but it had three bedrooms, a sunny kitchen, and enough room for the family we hoped to build.
