Mama motioned to the wall behind her. No, to the framed photograph over Lily’s bed. One of her earliest attempts at photography, the first she’d been really proud of. But it was only flower petals floating in a rain puddle. How did that teach her mother anything?

“That was my favorite rose, the one I’d hoped to enter into the contest at the ladies’ aid meeting that week. Do you remember?”

Lily lifted a shoulder in a shrug.

“When that storm came through and destroyed it, I was angry and frustrated. It had been perfect—perfect. And then it was nothing. But you, my sweet Lily”—Mama laughed softly—“you brought out your camera and you got down on your knees, and you showed me that what I deemed ruin was something beautiful. You found light in the darkness. Good in the bad. Like you always do.”

Lily’s nose ached with the tears she didn’t want to shed again. She shook her head. “With a camera, perhaps. But—”

“The camera can’t capture what you don’t first see.” Mama cupped Lily’s cheek in one hand. “You always see the beauty. Always. And you’ve taught me to find it too. That was what I woke up thinking about the day after the funeral—that the light is there, if I look for it as you always do. God is there. His promises have not changed just because my circumstances have. He is still the giver of all. The lover of our souls. No matter how bad our situation, He is still good. All we have to do is look for Him.”

Like Zivon had said—they must be still and know that He was God. Which meant He was good. He was love. He was mercy. He was life.

He was light. Even amid the darkest times.

Lily couldn’t see it, not fully. But if she focused, little glimmers peeked through. Glimpses of His mercies. Mama, well again—and offering forgiveness. Zivon, at her side every moment he possibly could be, and Daddy allowing it. The admiral, understanding of her need to closet herself away. Ara and all her other friends, stopping by each and every day to make sure she was all right.

And Ivy herself. All the laughter and smiles and memories she’d given her. It didn’t seem fair that God had taken her, but Lily needed to thank Him for giving her Ivy to begin with. Not everyone had years of such joy to recall.

“Your father will need our help, darling.” Now sorrow saturated Mama’s tone, colored even darker with worry. “Do you remember that trip to Brighton before the war, when Ivy’s hat blew off and he charged into the water to rescue it?”