I finally understood the cost of a secret. Eleanor had raised me, but she had never really held me. My mother had held me in her heart every single day, but she had never been allowed to touch my hand.

I walked to the funeral home to make the arrangements for Margaret. I didn’t know if anyone else would be there. I didn’t care. I stood in the lobby, looking at the guestbook, and realized that I was the only one who really knew who she was.

I decided to leave the journal in the casket with her. It felt like the only right thing to do. I wanted her to take those words with her, back to wherever it was she had been trying to go for thirty years.

I am sitting here tonight, looking at the quiet house. I am not the daughter of a woman who left, but I am the daughter of a woman who stayed in the shadows to protect me. It is a heavy thing to carry, but it is finally mine to hold.