Her voice was different.
Smaller.
She apologized.
Not only for the dinner.
For six years.
Then she said something I didn’t expect.
“My husband’s mother treated me exactly the same way.”
She had been a waitress from a small town in South Carolina.
Her mother-in-law called her “the waitress” for years.
“I promised myself I would never do that to my son’s wife.”
Her voice cracked.
“And then I called you ‘the teacher.’”
She did not ask for forgiveness.
Only whether she could see Wren someday.
“Even if you stay in the room,” she said. “Even if your father is there. Even if I have to sit in the corner.”
“You can see her in January.”
Then I added:
“And Beverly?”
“Yes?”
“You’ll hold her when I hand her to you.”
Silence.
Then:
“That’s fair.”
By February, Roland and I had begun rebuilding our marriage.
