My sister wore bridal white to my wedding because she wanted everyone looking at her and HUMILITIATE ME. “Surprise,” she whispered, waiting for me to fall apart. I smiled back. She had no idea I had bought that dress and sent it anonymously to her hotel. Then the pastor stepped forward with a sealed envelope. “Your mother left something for you.” Our mother had died eight months earlier—and left instructions for exactly this moment.

But she opened the letter anyway.

Her eyes moved across the first line, and almost immediately, the confidence disappeared from her face. She pressed one hand over her mouth while the paper shook between the fingers of the other.

My sweet Paige, if you are reading this, it means you are hurting louder than you are loving.

My throat tightened as I watched her.

I had already read my own letter, but I had never opened Paige’s. Mom had made that condition very clear: whatever she had written belonged to my sister, and Paige alone had to decide whether anyone else would hear it.

For several seconds, she said nothing.

Ethan gently squeezed my hand.

“You don’t have to continue this,” he whispered.

I looked toward Mom’s empty chair, where the blue scarf remained folded across the seat. Then I looked back at Paige, standing in the white dress she had chosen to wear as a challenge.

“Yes,” I whispered. “I do.”

Paige swallowed and looked at the letter again. When she finally began reading aloud, her voice was so quiet that the people in the back rows leaned forward to hear her.

“Mom says she knew the face I made whenever I felt forgotten. She knew I used jokes when I was hurting, and that I learned to say something cruel before anyone could ask what was wrong.”