And I understood something I have been slow to learn, which is that this is the last gift the people who outlive our parents can give us: they hand our parents back to us human-sized, complicated, funny, flawed, beloved, and in doing so they make it possible to forgive them, because it is so much easier to forgive a person than a parent.

Fran gave us Bernice back that night, and Bernice, given back, was someone I could love again.

We stayed until midnight.

When we left, Fran hugged us both and said, “You come back and see me.

You’re the closest thing to her I’ve got left.” And we promised we would, and we meant it.

Chapter 15 — The Empty House

In the morning we walked through the empty house one last time together, room by room, the reverse of the way Terry had first walked it alone, and this time neither of us was alone.

An empty house you grew up in is a strange and holy thing.