I settle on the bed and open the book to the first page. There’s an inscription.
To my darling genius son,
I found this in a shop, Duncan, and thought you might enjoy it. Please don’t let your sister get hold of this one. You know she’ll insist on reading it, even when it will give her nightmares.
Love always,
Mama
The warmth of those words settles over me. When I smile, my eyes glaze with tears. I don’t know this woman—I presume she’s gone and I’ll never get that chance—but in her words, I am reminded of my own mother.
When I graduated from university, I overheard extended family whispering about how disappointed my mother must be that I wasn’t going to law school. Did I not have the marks? Such a shame. Such a disappointment. I didn’t bristle at those words. I inwardly laughed at how little they knew my mother, who had never once tried to nudge my dream in line with hers. No more than my father tried to nudge me toward English when I wanted to study criminology and sociology.
I might be an only child, but my parents never made me carry the weight of their dreams. They’d found their own and encouraged me to do the same. I feel that same sentiment in these words, and I am happy for Gray in having that.
Does that make me think again of my own parents? Of what they’ll go through if I never return? Of what I’ll go through if I never see them again? Yes, it does, but this time it’s only a pinprick of pain, washed away by the certainty that Iwillsee them. The determination to do so, to find a way. My mood has lifted again, and so I am able to set that aside and focus on the moment.
I turn the page, and I tug the coverlet over me, and I pick up a cookie—biscuit,I remind myself—and I begin to read.