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Amy Summers looked like a woman half her age thanks to a strict diet, rigid exercise routine, and plastic surgery—which she adamantly denied having done. She prided herself on her looks and loved it when she was mistaken for their older sister rather than their mother. The dress she’d chosen for her daughter’s wedding was too short, too bold, and too revealing with its plunge neckline, but Ellie wasn’t about to say that out loud. It would only cause problems, and she wanted the rest of the day to go smoothly for her sister’s sake.
Not that Amy would intentionally ruin it. She wasn’t cruel or abusive or anything like that. She had been a good mother and they both loved her, but their relationship had grown complicated as they matured into adults and realized Amy was a little too self-absorbed to be the quintessential mother figure they longed for. Her love was deep for her girls, but she tended to put her needs before theirs, and it led to instances when both Alexis and Ellie felt more like the parent than the child.
Amy sashayed into the room, her crimson dress swishing around her thighs and her platinum hair styled to perfection. “Did I ever tell you what?”
Ellie looked at her sister for help. They both knew better than to mention Hope’s name. Their mother always closed down whenever her eldest daughter came up in conversation, but Ellie was also tired of tiptoeing around the topic.
Alexis nodded and mouthed, “Ask her.”
Ellie drew a breath, faced their mother, and broke the unspoken family rule. “We were talking about Hope.”
Amy’s expression froze into a brittle mask. Ellie could almost see the memories flicker in her mother’s eyes before they hardened into a cold, distant gaze.
“Hope,” Amy echoed as if it was a foreign word. She smoothed down her dress. “I don’t see why you’d be talking about her on a day like today.”
“We just... we miss her, Mom.”
Amy’s lips thinned into a line, and she looked at her youngest daughter curiously as if trying to decipher an unsolvable puzzle. Then her gaze slid toward Alexis.
“I wish she could’ve been here,” Alexis added.
The silence stretched on until it was almost unbearable. Then Amy shrugged with practiced nonchalance.
“It’s been over twenty years, girls.” Her voice was soft but firm, offering no room for argument. “She made her choices, and they didn’t include us, so let’s not spoil such a beautiful day by talking about her.”
“Why do you make it sound like she wanted to leave?” Ellie asked.
Amy Summers sighed and leaned over Alexis to check her makeup in the mirror. “I don’t want to talk about it.” She pulled a tube of lipstick from her clutch and layered it on even though she didn’t need more. “It’s not an appropriate conversation for a wedding.”
“Well, I’m the bride,” Alexis said. “And I get to decide what’s appropriate. I want to know, too. What really happened when she disappeared?”
“And why did you never look for her?” Ellie pressed. “You never really seemed to care.”
“I cared,” Amy said and snapped the clutch shut. “I’ve always cared. She’s my daughter.”
“Then why don’t you show it?”
“Because I’m tired.” Amy set her purse down on the vanity with a clatter. “I was tired of her drama then, and now I’m tired of her ghost hanging over this family. She left on her own accord. She wasn’t forced into that car or tricked. She wanted to leave. She chose to leave us.”
“Did she really?” Ellie shot back. “Or did you choose to let her go?”
The accusation hung in the air between them like a lethal blade ready to sever fragile ties.
Amy, for her part, didn’t balk at Ellie’s words, but her blue eyes bore into her daughter’s. “Both.”
“Please, Mom,” Alexis said softly. “Just tell us what happened. Don’t you think it’s time we know?”
She sighed and dropped to the chaise beside the vanity. “Oh, I’m sorry, girls. I know I should’ve talked to you both about this a long time ago. It’s just… difficult for me. Hope was always different. From the moment she was old enough to walk and talk, she was all emotion, energy, and mischief. You were too young to understand the turmoil she caused in our family. She was damaged. I don’t know if she was just that way from birth or if I damaged her or maybe both. I was so young when I had her. Only seventeen, still a child myself, and I made so many mistakes until I met your father. But by then, it was already too late to fix what was broken in Hope. But I tried, girls. So did he. He even adopted her, gave her his name so we could be a complete family. I swear, we tried everything. Discipline, affection, therapy... but nothing seemed to reach her. She didn’t want my help, and she certainly didn’t want your father’s. She was barely a teenager when she started the drugs and the partying, and then came the much older men… I had to choose between helping her or keeping you two safe. It’s a choice no mother should ever have to make, but I made it. And when she walked out that day and didn’t come home… God help me, I was relieved. I was relieved not because I wanted her gone but because it meant you girls were safe from her chaos.”
“But why didn’t we search for her?” Ellie asked.
Amy looked down at her hands. “We did,” she said quietly. “Your father and I exhausted every resource we had, but it was like chasing a ghost. She didn’t want to be found, and life was so much easier without her. Eventually, I realized that maybe I didn’t want to find her.”
“Did you love her, Mom?” Alexis whispered.
Amy’s eyes welled up with tears, and for a moment, there was silence. “More than you’ll ever know,” she said at last. “She was my firstborn. My baby girl. She was beautiful and full of life. But her life... she was a hurricane damaging everything in her path.”
Ellie’s heart ached at the pain in her mother’s voice. For years she’d thought that their mother had been negligent, more concerned about a semblance of peace than finding Hope. But hearing Amy’s confession tore away that illusion, revealing the heartbreaking truth of a mother caught in an impossible situation. And now she realized she’d been too harsh on their mother. Amy had a lot of faults, but she loved all of her daughters in her own way.
