Part 2
My heart began pounding.
“What does this mean?”
Tessa wiped her cheeks.
“Mom was the last person to see your father alive.”
I stared at the page.
“Why?”
“Because they argued.”
“About what?”
“About me.”
I couldn’t understand.
Tessa explained slowly.
My father had been trying to establish legal custody of her.
He wanted her to live with him and my mother.
My mother had been terrified.
She had already been struggling financially, and she believed another child would destroy whatever stability she had left.
“So she gave me up?” I asked.
“No.”
Tessa shook her head.
“Dad wouldn’t let her.”
She told me that my parents had argued the night before his fatal accident.
He had left the apartment angry.
Hours later, he died.
My mother blamed herself.
“She thought the argument caused him to leave the house,” Tessa whispered. “And she spent the rest of her life believing she had sent him to his death.”
I looked at the letter again.
There was more.
When your father died, I was pregnant with you. I was alone, frightened, and convinced I would lose everything.
Tessa had nowhere safe to go.
I couldn’t abandon her.
So I brought her home.
My chest tightened.
All those years, I had thought Mom had simply chosen Tessa over me.
But she hadn’t.
She had been trying to keep a promise to my father.
Still, one question remained.
“Why did she let me believe Tessa was adopted?”
Tessa looked down.
“Because she was afraid you’d resent me.”
I laughed bitterly.
“I did.”
Tessa nodded.
“I know.”
“I thought she loved you more.”
“She didn’t.”
“Then why did she give you everything?”
Tessa looked at me through her tears.
“Because she knew you had your whole life ahead of you.”
I frowned.
“What does that mean?”
“She believed I had already lost enough.”
My eyes filled.
Tessa continued.
“Every time she gave me the better piece of pie, she felt guilty about the life I had lost. Every time she gave me something you wanted, she told herself you would have opportunities I wouldn’t.”
“But she never explained that.”
“I know.”
“She let me hate you.”
Tessa’s voice broke.
“I know.”
Silence filled the room.
I looked at the girl who had once been a stranger carrying a plastic bag of clothes.
The girl who had shared my home.
The girl who had covered for me when I broke curfew.
The girl who had hidden twenty dollars in my suitcase before college.
The girl who had stayed with our mother when I moved away.
My sister.
My father’s daughter.
My family.
“Why didn’t you ever tell me?” I asked.
She smiled sadly.
“Because Mom asked me not to.”
“Even when I was cruel to you?”
“You were a child.”
“I was jealous.”
“You were hurting.”
“I thought you stole my place.”
Tessa shook her head.
“I thought you were the only person in the world who could understand me.”
That sentence destroyed the last piece of anger I had been holding onto.
I began crying.
“Why didn’t you hate me?”
She reached across the table.
“Because you were my little sister.”
I took her hand.
“You knew that before I did.”
She smiled.
“I always knew.”
We sat there holding hands.
Then I remembered the final pages in the envelope.
“There’s more.”
Tessa nodded.
“Yes.”
“What is it?”
“Mom left instructions.”
“For what?”
“For us.”
She handed me another letter.
This one was shorter.
I have spent too many years believing that protecting my daughters meant keeping them apart from the truth.
I was wrong.
You are sisters. Not because I brought Tessa into our home. Not because you share a father. You are sisters because you chose each other, even when you didn’t know the whole story.
Please don’t let my mistakes become yours.
I couldn’t read any further.
I folded the letter against my chest.
“She knew,” I whispered.
“Knew what?”
“That we’d eventually find our way back to each other.”
Tessa leaned against my shoulder.
For the first time since Mom’s funeral, neither of us tried to hide our tears.
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