Claire had laughed exactly that way.
I felt as though someone had reached into my chest and pulled apart every belief that had held me together for ten years.
If that woman was Claire, then she had not drowned.
She had chosen to disappear.
She had abandoned six children.
And while I had been sitting beside their beds during nightmares, she had been somewhere else, building a new life.
The Anger I Was Ashamed to Feel
Noah and I drove to Cresthollow the following morning.
The younger children stayed with my friend Marcus and his wife.
For the first two hours, we barely spoke.
I kept both hands tight around the steering wheel while the same thoughts repeated in my mind.
Ten years.
Ten birthdays.
Ten Christmas mornings.
Ten years of scraped knees, school projects, financial worries, and children crying for a mother who might have been alive the entire time.
