"You just came from a funeral.
You're upset.
This isn't the time to — "
"Was I adopted?
Yes or no."
Another pause.
Shorter this time.
"Come home," she said.
"Come home and we'll talk."
I gripped the wheel.
"That's not a no."
"It's not a conversation for the phone." Her voice had changed.
The warmth was still there but something underneath it had shifted — a door that had always been closed suddenly visible in the wall.
"Please.
Just come home."
I drove the forty minutes without the radio.
I rehearsed nothing.
Every sentence I tried to build fell apart before it finished.
My mother was waiting in the kitchen when I arrived.
She had made tea.
Two cups, already poured, sitting on the table like a peace offering.
She looked older than she had the last time I visited.
Or maybe I was just seeing her differently.
I sat down.
I did not touch the tea.
