Title Page

Copyright Notice

The author and publisher have provided this e-book to you for your personal use only. You may not make this e-book publicly available in any way. Copyright infringement is against the law. If you believe the copy of this e-book you are reading infringes on the author’s copyright, please notify the publisher at: us.macmillanusa.com/piracy.

This book is dedicated to my children,
Meagan Steele Henry, Patrick Thomas Henry, Jr., and George
Rusk Henry. They are the most open piece of my heart;
the most creative part of my soul.

Epigraph

To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket—safe, dark, motionless, airless—it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.

—C. S. Lewis

One

One

There are both wonderful and awful moments in a woman’s life. Many of them, really. Standing in a white dress in front of family and friends, vowing to forever love the handsome man in front of me, is on top of my wonderful list. Then years later, standing in the receiving line at my mother’s funeral and pulling away from that same man’s touch because I knew I didn’t—couldn’t—love him anymore is more than awful. It’s tragic.

In these pages, I will try to wrap words around all of the tumultuous, confusing emotions, attempt to make sense out of what at the moment feels senseless.

MOTHER’S FUNERAL

On the day of my mother’s funeral there was only one type of flower: lilies. Everywhere. There were too many to count. With all the flowers in the world, the millions of blossoms and buds, you’d have thought that someone would have brought another sort.

I know what the lily means in the language of flowers: innocence, purity, and beauty. But this is not why the church overflowed with lilies. For twelve generations, or maybe longer, the firstborn daughters of firstborn daughters in our family are named Lillian. I understood why mourners brought these blooms, but God, the aroma was overwhelming, drowning me in cloying sweetness.

Sadie, my best friend, stood next to me in the funeral receiving line. “Ellie,” she whispered.

“What?” I leaned closer to her.

“I wonder if there are any lilies left in all of Atlanta. This is insanity.”

“It still wouldn’t be enough for her,” I said.

Sadie laughed in the quiet manner of churchlike respect. “No,” she said, “it would not have been enough.”