She looked at Dad. “He called me.”
Dad whispered, “I asked her to dinner.”
“And you canceled seeing him again.”
Helen nodded.
“Why?”
She looked at Mom’s scratched-out face beside hers. “Because I heard Maggie’s voice saying I was taking her place.”
I took the photograph.
Both of them looked at me.
“No. You don’t get to do this anymore.”
Dad frowned. “Rachel.”
“You don’t get to keep dating women Mom approved because you’re scared of the one she didn’t. And Helen, you don’t get to keep leaving because a dying woman asked you to disappear.”
Neither spoke.
I pointed at the two empty chairs.
“Sit.”
Helen almost smiled. “You’re ordering us around now?”
“Apparently somebody has to.”
Dad looked at her.
For the first time since I’d arrived, she looked back.
I picked up my coat.
Dad stood.
“Where are you going?”
“Home.”
“What are we supposed to do?”
I looked at the scratched photograph.
“I don’t know.”
Then I looked at him. “That’s the point.”
Six weeks later, Dad called me after dinner.
He sounded nervous.
“I saw Helen tonight.”
I smiled.
“At the restaurant?”
“No.”
