“So, why couldn’t Amira come today?” Sophia asks as we head back to our cars after picking out the funeral plot.

I shrug. “I didn’t ask her to.”

She stops walking and lifts one brow at me. “Why not? Did you guys have a fight?”

I’m not going to tell her about my suspicions, but I feel like Amira’s suspicions about me are fair game. “Kinda. She thought I was the baby’s mother.”

“I’m sorry,” Sophia says. “I don’t think I realized how hard this must be for you until last night. Until that crowd practically came after you with torches and pitchforks.”

“They think I’m lying about not being the mother. But you don’t, do you? How are you so sure everyone else is wrong about me?”

I realized last night that Sophia would never have given me a speech about how the town of Clifford needs to heal if she thought she was talking to the mother of a dead baby. Is it because she’s the baby’s mother? Am I just starting to suspect everyone now? Have I officially lost my mind?

Sophia shrugs as we start walking again. “I have no reason to think you’re lying. And I think people deserve the benefit of the doubt.”

Well, that’s refreshing.

She brushes her hair over her shoulder, exposing the name brand of her expensive down jacket. “I should have listened to you about the vigil, though. I don’t think that helped anyone heal.”

“You were just trying to do something nice.” Misguided though it was.

“Still, you were right.” She clicks the button on her fob to unlock her car door. “The vigil was a bad idea, considering the negative attention this has been getting. But the funeral isn’t. The headstone and the grave aren’t. Those are for the baby. They’re the least we owe her.” She opens her door and slides behind the wheel. “For failing to notice.”

Sophia gives me a sad smile as she closes her door. Then she starts her car and pulls down the narrow cemetery path and through the gates.

Mom’s car is in the driveway when I get home, and the front curtains are open. For a second, I sit in my car, looking through the window at all the smiles as my mother, brother, and sister string lights around the tree.

I thought this would be more of a bittersweet holiday, since it’s our first Christmas without Dad. But for once, I would be happy to be proven wrong.