Chapter 5 - The Woman in the Old Photograph

David Rosen would not discuss account balances.

He did, however, explain the rules.

“A custodial account belongs to the minor,” he told Amara over the phone the following afternoon. “The custodian manages it, but withdrawals are supposed to benefit the minor.”

“What counts as benefit?”

“That depends on circumstances.”

“Can the custodian spend it on herself?”

“No.”

The answer came instantly.

Amara gripped her phone tighter.

“Can she use it for regular household bills?”

“There can be legal questions about expenses a parent already has an obligation to provide. I can’t advise you about your specific situation without reviewing records.”

Amara understood the careful language.

“Thank you.”

Before hanging up, David added, “If you are the beneficiary and you’re concerned, preserve whatever documents you have. Don’t alter anything.”

Preserve.

The word made the situation feel real.

That evening, Amara searched the attic.

Not for bank documents.

For Evelyn.

If her grandmother had deliberately written Give her choices, perhaps Evelyn had known something Amara didn’t.

In an old cedar trunk she found photographs.

Vanessa at ten.

Vanessa at thirteen.

Vanessa at seventeen.

Amara stopped.

The photograph showed a teenage Vanessa standing beside an older woman in front of a banquet hall.

Both wore red.

Not identical dresses.

But close enough to make Amara’s skin prickle.

Teenage Vanessa’s smile looked forced.

The older woman beside her—Amara’s great-grandmother Loretta—stood with one hand at Vanessa’s waist.

On the back someone had written:

Vanessa’s Spring Formal — 2000

Amara heard the attic ladder creak.

She turned.

A woman’s voice said, “I wondered when you’d find that.”

Aunt Renee climbed into view.

Vanessa’s younger sister was thirty-nine, practical, soft-spoken, and almost aggressively uninterested in glamour.

“What are you doing here?” Amara asked.

“Your mother called.”

Amara’s stomach dropped.

“Why?”

“She said you were going through Grandma’s things and acting strange.”

Renee noticed the photograph.

Her face changed.

“You know about this?”

Renee sat on an old storage bin.

“Enough.”

“What happened?”

For several seconds, Renee rubbed her thumb along the edge of another photograph.

“Grandma Loretta was complicated.”

“That means terrible.”

Renee smiled faintly.

“Sometimes.”

She took the photograph.

“When your mother was seventeen, she saved for months to buy a dress for a spring formal. Loretta went shopping afterward and bought something almost identical.”

Amara stared.

“She wore it?”

“To the event.”

“Why?”

“Because people kept telling her she looked too young to have teenage daughters.”

Amara felt sick.

“What happened?”

“Your mother begged her not to come dressed like that.”

“And?”

“She came.”

Renee looked at the photograph.

“Then she spent half the night taking pictures with Vanessa’s friends and joking that people would think they were sisters.”

The boutique flashed through Amara’s mind.

Maybe the boys will think we’re sisters.

Almost the same words.

“Did Mom ever tell you how she felt?”

“Oh, yes.”

Renee’s voice became quieter.

“She cried in the bathroom.”

Amara looked toward the old photograph.

“Then how could she do exactly the same thing to me?”

“That,” Renee said, “is a question only Vanessa can answer.”

A sound came from below.

The attic ladder shifted.

Vanessa appeared.

Her eyes went immediately to the photograph.

Then to Renee.

“What are you telling her?”

Renee stood.

“The truth.”

“Which truth?”

“The one in her hand.”

Vanessa climbed the final step.

“That was twenty-six years ago.”

Amara held up the picture.

“You cried?”

Vanessa’s jaw tightened.

“Give me that.”

“You knew exactly what you were doing at the boutique.”

“Give me the photograph, Amara.”

“You knew.”

Vanessa snatched it from her.

For the first time, Amara saw something beneath her mother’s anger.

Not embarrassment.

Panic.

Vanessa looked at Renee.

“You had no right.”

Renee folded her arms.

“She has every right to understand why her mother is repeating something that hurt her.”

Vanessa’s face went cold.

“You think you understand what happened?”

“Then explain it.”

Vanessa looked at Amara.

She seemed ready to speak.

Instead she tore the photograph in half.

Amara flinched.

Vanessa dropped both pieces into a box.

“Some memories,” she said, “deserve to stay dead.”

Then she climbed down.

Renee waited until Vanessa was gone.

“Your mother always does that.”

“What?”

“Destroys the evidence when the memory doesn’t flatter her.”

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Amara looked at the torn photograph.

And thought of the missing lavender note.