When my mother-in-law died, I felt relief, not grief. She had never accepted me. But at the memorial, my husband handed me a velvet box she insisted I open alone. Inside was a sapphire pendant engraved with my initials—and a letter.
She confessed she’d hated me because I reminded her of the bold woman she once was, before marriage stifled her. The pendant came from Lucas, her lost love. “I always wanted a daughter,” she wrote. “In a way, I see her in you.”
Later, a key she left unlocked her attic: journals, paintings, dreams silenced by regret. With her gift of money, I opened a gallery—The Teardrop—in her honor.
Her final act turned enemies into kin.
