“I’m not really hungry.” Betsy sighs. “One. And toast. Thanks.” She’s on her phone, no doubt texting Bo with their secret messaging app. She smells the roses. She takes a photo of them and then a selfie with the roses behind her. She smiles as she sends the shots to him. “I’ll go get ready for school while you make breakfast. We’re supposed to wear our graduation outfits for photos at noon. We’ll all be a mess by the ceremony.”

Likely you will be at least, but I don’t tell her that. She is the opposite of dainty. She’d never last in the South. Well, I guess I didn’t, either. “You’ll be wearing a gown. It will cover everything up.”

“Good point.” Betsy hoists the huge vase of roses into her arms and seems to float out of the kitchen.

While Betsy is downstairs getting ready, I make us breakfast. And set two places next to each other at the table. We’ll both face out to the ocean. And I’ll try to be fine with it. It’s sort of like our last supper as mother and daughter. After today, my nest will be empty.

I stare out the window to the huge, dark, cold ocean on the horizon. It looks so perfect. I take a deep breath and fight off the panic attack. It’s time for me to move on from that, too. Everything will come to light, and it will be a new season of mourning. This time, though, I won’t hide out and lose weight. No, this time I’ll give interviews, up my social media game. I’ve already reached out to a few industry people, starting to circulate my name. And those new head shots next week will be fabulous.

“Thanks for cooking.” Betsy walks into the room. She is beautiful, just not as pretty as Mary or me. She wears a purple dress that hugs her petite and perfect figure and, believe it or not, dressy heels instead of army boots. She’s even removed the nose piercing and has regular earrings in. She looks like the girl I imagine her to be.

She pulls out the chair and sits down. Her arms palms up on the table reveal her Mary tattoo on one wrist, and on the other wrist, the infinity symbol matching Bo’s. I know she’s feeling powerful, revealing her tattoos to me, taunting me. That’s fine, she can have the morning, I’ll take tonight.

“You look beautiful, honey, you really do.”

“You seem surprised.” She chomps a bite of egg on toast.

“What does that symbol mean again?” I resist the urge to grab her wrist, flip her palm over.

“We are all one.” Betsy chews another bite.