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“I had no idea,” he said.

“Of course you didn’t. No one knows about that part. Not even Izzie.” She’d only dared go so far in her letter because she didn’t want to taint her sister’s memories of their mother. Not like that.

“After that, the guilt set in and I tried my hardest to show my mother how sorry I was. I kept the shop neat and tidy. I delivered orders. I managed the paperwork and did all the accounting. I kept thinking that one day she might notice how hard I was working and she’d forgive me at least a little bit.

“Instead, she poured all of her love into Izzie. How could she not? Izzie was so like her. Izzie could sew, and she seemed to know inherently how clothes should fit. When I was living at home, they never argued because Izzie never pushed back. She was so good.

“By the time Hugo came along, I felt like a stranger in my own family. For the first time since my father died, there was someone telling me I was worth loving.” She smiled sadly. “When he asked me to marry him, the choice seemed obvious. I could stay at the shop and know that every day I reminded my mother of everything she’d lost, or I could become Hugo’s wife and live my own life.”

“And so you said yes,” said William.

She nodded. “I suppose I should have expected it, but when I told my mother about the engagement, all she said to me was ‘I suppose you’ll be happy to see the backs of us.’ I said I would never think that, but then at the wedding everything went wrong. I remember looking up at the wedding breakfast and watching them walk out early. That made me angry. I thought that if they couldn’t even stay for the entirety of my wedding, I didn’t need them anymore. They could telephone or write to me when they decided they wanted me around. Then, before I knew it, months had gone by and I didn’t know how to even begin to repair things.”

She twisted her empty glass in her hands, wishing that it was full again. Wishing that she hadn’t said any of that to William, yet it had broken her heart a little to think that he or any of the other people who had watched her grow up thought she hadn’t cared.

“Have you told your sister any of this?” he asked.

“Not really. I told her a little bit about the Sheltons.”

“You should tell her about your mother and what it was like living under the same roof with her,” he said.

“I can’t do that to her. Izzie idolized our mother,” she said.

He sat back and studied her. “Do you know, I think that neither you nor Mrs. Shelton had any idea just how strong a person your sister is. Whether your mother gave her credit or not, Izzie had been all but running that shop day to day before being conscripted. Now she’s off serving—something neither you nor I are doing.”

“You’re right,” she whispered. “I don’t know how to be a sister to her anymore. She doesn’t trust me.”

“You have to earn her trust, Sylvia. There’s no quick way about it, but it will happen over time,” he said.

She opened her mouth to protest that it was no use, but then she thought of the letter that remained unanswered on the bedside table in the room she used to share with her sister. Izzie had sent her a sketch, and wasn’t that a start?

“There are so many things I need to say, but I’m afraid she won’t want to hear them,” she said.

This time, when William reached for her, he closed the gap and touched her. She sucked in a breath as his fingers wrapped lightly around her hand, enveloping her in comfort even as she felt as though she was dancing on a knife point.

“Start with what happened after your father died,” he said.

“I don’t know if I’m brave enough to do that,” she admitted.

“The Sylvia Shelton I once knew was fearless.”

“Too much has changed. I’m not that girl any longer,” she said.

“No, you’re not,” he agreed. “You’re something more. I’ve always thought that.”

There was another meaning behind his words—a meaning she couldn’t begin to examine. Not while she was desperately trying to grasp at the unwinding threads of her life.

“I think that what I want right now is a friend,” she said softly.

He nodded, gave her hand a light squeeze, and then let go.

“I’ve always been your friend, Sylvia. Nothing will ever change that.”

That night, after William had gone, Sylvia lay on her sister’s bed staring at the ceiling. She supposed that she should be grateful that, sometime after she’d left, Izzie had changed from the single bed that had once matched her own to a double. Still, her mind was fixed on her conversation with William.

She hadn’t meant to tell him about Papa. It had just slipped out, the confessional mood of the evening loosening her tongue. She’d regretted it as they walked back to the shop—perhaps she should regret it now—but after the initial shock of sharing something she had kept bottled up for so long had worn off, she’d found herself glad. She trusted William, and it wasn’t just because her mother and Izzie trusted him. It was because he was solid, steady, dependable.

Only that wasn’t all he was.