He was gone for four hours.
He came back with two boxes and a look on his face I had never seen before.
Not the locked-door look. Not the controlled-breathing, jaw-tight, keeping-it-in look.
Something else entirely.
Something open and devastated and very, very still.
He put the boxes down.
Stood in the hallway.
I waited.
"I found something," he said.
• • •
His father had kept it in a shoebox at the back of the hall closet.
A letter.
Sealed. Addressed in handwriting Cassian recognized immediately even though he hadn't seen it since he was eleven years old.
His name on the front.
In his mother's handwriting.
His father had known it existed the entire time.
Had kept it.
Had never said a word.
• • •
I sat with him while he read it.
I didn't read it myself — that wasn't mine to have. I was just there beside him on the couch, and I watched him read it twice and then fold it very carefully and hold it between both hands like something that might not survive being held wrong.
He didn't say anything for a long time.
Then: "She knew about you."
I didn't say anything.
"She — she says." His voice careful. Controlled. "She says she always knew. About me and you." A pause. "She called you the good thing." He stopped. Swallowed. "The good thing in my life."
I put my hand over his.
He let me.
• • •
Later — much later — he let me read it.
It was dated the week she died. She had written it knowing.
