Evelyn sat at the wrought-iron table on the mansion’s veranda with a fine porcelain tea set laid out between us.

She dabbed at her eyes with a linen napkin, then carefully smoothed the ends of her green silk scarf.

“I haven’t had a full hour of sleep since you came back to Oakridge,” she said.

She reached into her designer handbag, took out a pale blue checkbook, and set it on the glass tabletop next to my porcelain cup.

“Your father and I stayed up half the night talking out here,” she said, her voice falling to a low, tender whisper laced with conditional affection.

“We spent so many years stuck in old arguments that we lost track of what really matters to this family.”