Pulling the stuff on the closet floor out into the hallway, she realized that there was an order to the chaos. She found one pink rubber flip-flop, a ziplock bag full of small items like ponytail holders and barrettes, and one Cinderella sock—all items that she’d left behind when she was a little girl. She wrote Flynn’s name on one box, April’s on another, and her own on a third, and then sorted the coloring books, puzzles, and all their old memories into the right places.

The stuff on the first and second shelves seemed to belong to Nanny Lucy’s children, and Nessa had to guess at a few things, but most of the items didn’t leave much doubt. She wrote Matthew’s name on the last empty box. Matthew’s toy guns with his initials on the belt went into the one labeled for him. Rachel’s Barbie dolls went into hers. Isaac’s first little New Testament went into his box.

When Nessa reached the top shelf, where the suitcase was stored, she had to bring a chair from the kitchen to stand on. There was very little on the shelf—an old railroad hat and a tiny box that held two gold wedding rings. What had Nanny Lucy thought when she put those rings away? Had she been relieved that she didn’t have to keep up the farce of being married to a cheater, or had it made her sad? Nessa carefully opened the suitcase and added those two items to it and then carried everything, box by box, out to the garage and stacked the boxes up in one corner.

“The quilt tops were on top of the suitcase,” she said as she went back into the house. “The hat was Grandpa. The quilts were you.” She had picked up the chair to bring it back to the kitchen when she noticed the corner of something yellow sticking out from the bottom of the top shelf. She set the chair down, held on to the back of it, and stood on it again. Sure enough, there was an envelope stuck in the crack between the shelf and the wall. She yanked it free, got down off the chair, and then sat down.

She turned it over and over in her hands. There was no name on the front of the envelope, but it was sealed. How a corner had gotten stuck was a mystery because the thing was downright hefty. Hoping that it was a long letter from Nanny Lucy explaining more about her decisions, she ripped into the paper, and hundred-dollar bills tumbled down onto the floor.

“Why did you hide this money?” Nessa frowned. “And in that closet, of all places. Were you saving up so you could divorce Grandpa?”