Chapter 14
Claribel asked to see me after ten months.
I agreed.
Neutral restaurant.
Daylight.
No romance.
She looked thinner.
Less polished.
Still Claribel.
She did not ask about Milo first.
Good.
She asked about Beatrice.
“She speaks?”
“A little.”
Tears filled her eyes.
“Does she hate me?”
“Ask her someday if she lets you.”
Claribel nodded.
Then:
“I understand now why I kept saying she approved things.”
I waited.
“Because if Beatrice approved them, I didn’t have to feel like I was competing with her.”
Interesting.
If the mother herself supposedly chose Claribel’s rules, Claribel could pretend she had already been accepted as successor inside the household.
Not organizational successor.
Emotional.
She wanted Beatrice to authorize her taking control.
When Beatrice refused, Claribel manufactured consent.
“And Milo?”
Her face collapsed.
“I wanted him to need me.”
There.
“He didn’t.”
“No.”
“He needed his father.”
“Yes.”
“He needed his grandmother.”
“Yes.”
“And I kept reading that as rejection.”
She cried.
“I know how insane that sounds.”
“It sounds dangerous.”
She nodded.
Better word.
Then:
“I don’t expect you to forgive me.”
Good.
“I don’t.”
She accepted it.
Before leaving, she asked one thing.
“Tell Milo I’m sorry?”
“No.”
She stared.
“If you ever apologize to him, you do it yourself when he wants to hear it.”
Important.
No more speaking through others.
She almost laughed at the irony.
May you like
So did I.
Then we left separately.
