Chapter 29 — Silence Is Not Innocence

My mother eventually moved back to Ohio.

As the truth spread through her social circle, several of the women who had sat at those tables began to distance themselves from her.

One of them — the woman who had demanded iced tea in my kitchen — called Aurora weeks later to apologize, in tears.

“I saw things in that kitchen and I looked the other way because it was easier,” she admitted.

“I’m ashamed of myself.” Aurora listened, accepted it, and hung up.