PART 17: Hannah’s Birthday

Her nineteenth birthday arrived on a bright summer morning.

I woke early and took out the box where I had stored her last letter, the photograph of her with Chloe, and a few birthday cards she’d kept from childhood.

Kenneth was in the kitchen making pancakes the way she liked them, thin at the edges with far too much cinnamon.

“I didn’t ask you to do that,” I said.