For Years I Resented the Homeless Boy My Mother Fed. After Her Funeral, He Revealed the Secret She Had Kept From Me.

But we had made choices afterward, and some had hurt people.

“Can we be friends now?” I asked, feeling strangely shy.

Gabriel set down the towel.

“I’d like that very much.”

We returned to the dining room, where the last slices of pie waited beneath a clean cloth.

PART 17