LUCY
"You were so happy in that picture," Mother said. "It made me almost believe I had not failed as a parent."
I drew a sharp look at her and staggered backward, ashamed that I had tended the embers of a painful past. It wasn't fair. I looked back at the picture through a film of tears while mom continued speaking.
"I know I put you in this place and I am truly sorry. It's just that June reminds me a lot of you and when I think of the kind of mother I was when your father died, I guess it made me scared for you."
I knew what she meant. It did not make me feel better. I was a monster to have let it prop up to this. When my Dad died, I became a recluse. I blamed my mother for his death, became a foolish rebellious teen and it was on one of these rebellious phases that I met Grant. She
