“You always thought you were her favorite,” she whispered. “Now you know better.”
I kept walking.
I refused to let her see me cry.
But the moment I reached my car, I placed the box on the passenger seat and broke down.
My mother had been gone for less than two weeks.
I missed her voice.
I missed the way she called me on Sunday evenings and asked whether I was eating properly.
I missed how she could tell I was upset from a single word.
The inheritance should not have mattered.
I knew that.
Love was not measured in houses or bank accounts.
But grief makes people fragile, and Lila’s words had reached the part of me already filled with doubt.
I drove home with the shawl beside me.
For the next several days, I left the box unopened on a chair in my bedroom.
Every time I passed it, I felt a mixture of sadness and resentment.
Eventually, one rainy evening, I carried the box into the living room.
I made tea, sat on the couch, and lifted the lid.
The shawl lay folded exactly as my mother had always folded it.
I picked it up carefully.
The fabric was softer than I remembered.
