Chapter 25 — Six Months Later

Six months later, the early autumn air in Austin had gone crisp and clear, and I was sitting on the wide stone terrace behind the house, in the exact spot where, half a year earlier, I had found my mother on her knees with a bucket of gray water.

You would not have known it was the same place.

The old outdoor kitchen was gone entirely, torn out and rebuilt into a peaceful garden terrace, full of potted hydrangeas and comfortable lounge chairs, with a small stone fountain that trickled softly in the breeze.

I had wanted that spot, above all others, transformed, so that my mother would never again look at it and see the worst months of her life.