She swallowed, gaze fixed on the ground, and I couldn’t place her expression. Was she embarrassed about something?
“Felicity, you have to understand. When I left, I had no job, no way to support myself.” She bit her lip, and the look on her facefinally resonated with me. Rose looked guilty. “I needed the money to get back on my feet.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked, eyes narrowing. “What money?”
There was a second or two of silence as she hesitated, but then she said, “The educational trust that Mom and Dad set up for me. I was never going to use it for school, so Mom gave me access on the condition that I keep out of your life.”
I stared at her, trying to process the enormity of what she’d said. “Mompaidyou to stay away?”
“Hey, listen to me,” Rose said, stretching across the table for my hand. “Leaving you behind was one of the toughest things I’ve ever done, okay? But I needed to figure outme, and I couldn’t do that at home. Not with Mom. Things were too toxic between us.”
I pulled my hand away from hers.
No one needed to remind me of how unhealthy my sister and mother’s relationship had been. So I understood why Rose had to make a clean break from her—and consequently, me. But that didn’t mean the truth didn’t hurt like hell.
“Fel?” Rose whispered, and I’d never heard her sound so small before. “Please don’t hate me.”
I dropped my chin to my chest so she couldn’t see my expression. “It’s her I hate, not you.”
“Don’t say that, Felicity.”
My head snapped up so fast I smacked it on the cabinet behind me, but I was too surprised by her response to feel any of the pain. “Why not?”
“Because she loves you and—”
“Whoa, hold up.” I lifted a hand to stop her. “Are you seriously defending her right now?”
“I’m not saying what she did was right, because it definitely wasn’t.” Rose said, backtracking. “But take it from someone who spent years loathing her. It’s not worth it.”
“So you’ve forgiven her?” I asked, incredulous. “After everything she’s done?”
“Not entirely, but I’m trying, because I want to be happy,” she said. “Hatred takes up more space in your heart than you realize, and it doesn’t leave room for things like love and joy. Trust me.”
“You don’t understand, Rose. Everything I’ve done since you left has been for Mom. Everyone who loved her abandoned her, and I felt this responsibility to make up for that.” I wrapped my arms around my stomach. “Stupid thirteen-year-old me figured if I study law at Stanford, become a lawyer, and am successful, then maybe she’d be happy again.”
“You don’t need a fancy diploma or a job at a law firm to do that, Fel.Youmake her happy.”
“That’s not the point. All the choices I’ve made over the past four years have been based on a lie!” I exclaimed.
“Are you saying that you wouldn’t have studied as hard if you’d known the truth about me leaving, or if I’d never left at all?” Rose asked, shooting me a disbelieving look. “Because if that’s the case, maybe Mom made the right decision.”
“How can you say that? I’ve spent all this time focusing on becoming the person I thought would make her happy insteadof the personIwant to be, and now I feel like I don’t know who I am.”
“You’re only seventeen,” Rose said with a laugh. “Nobody knows exactly who they are at that age. Shit, I’m twenty-two and I’m still figuring out who I am.”
I couldn’t think of a response—at least, not one that would help Rose see my perspective. Learning the truth about what’d happened four years ago was exhausting and more emotionally draining than I’d anticipated.
“Look,” Rose said when our silence grew too tense to bear. “I’ve been where you are. When Mom kicked me out, I felt so betrayed. I know you’re hurting, but I haven’t seen you in so long. I don’t want to waste another minute arguing about her.”
She was right. Mom had already stolen so much time from us. Why was I letting her take even more?
“Okay,” I said, taking a calming breath and trying—at least for the time being—to put Mom out of mind. “Tell me all about Nicoli.”
***
“…and here’s one of us with hisnonna,” Rose said, pointing to a picture of her, Nicoli, and an older woman.
We’d moved from the kitchen to the living room couch, and Rose was showing me a photo album of the month she’d stayed with Nicoli’s family in Naples. So far, I’d learned that her boyfriend was twenty-four, the sous-chef at one of the highest-rated restaurants in Seattle, and that his dream was to open his own bistro.
