Part of me, the tired and angry part, felt something almost like relief, even vindication, that she had done it, that she had removed my last reason to hesitate.

But underneath that, there was a deeper and sadder thing, which was the fresh astonishment, even after fifteen years, that she would actually do it.

Some part of me, some foolish loyal part left over from the years when I loved her, had gone on half-hoping right up until that moment that she would surprise me, that she would come and be, for one afternoon, a decent guest at her daughter’s wedding, that she would not stand in a room full of strangers and try to steal from my children the truth of who had raised them.

She did it anyway.