Chapter 24: Sadie Decides

I opened the box on the kitchen floor in his shirt, with my back against the cabinets and my coffee going cold.

Ezra sat down across from me with his legs crossed and did not say a word.

The box was small and the tape on it had yellowed.

Inside, on a bed of tissue, lay one brown glass bottle with a cork, and under it a single sheet folded in thirds.

I unfolded it with my good hand.

It was the same fast writing that leaned to the right.

Sadie,

If you are reading this, you are married, and I hope it was your choice.

I told you pretty gets you attention, and attention gets you trouble.

I should have told you the rest.

Plain keeps the wrong people from coming close.

It never keeps the right one away.

The blend you wear has five oils.

I wrote only three in the book because your father reads everything.

The other two are in the bottle.

Make it your own.

Don't ever sell it to anyone who hasn't earned the smell of your skin.

I am so proud of you that it makes me clumsy.

Mom

I read it twice.

Then I put the page against my chest and breathed, and this time I let it come.

I had not cried at the funeral, because my father had been watching.

I cried now into his shirt sleeve, in a kitchen with nobody watching but the man I had married.

He did not say it would be all right.

He moved across the floor and sat with his back against the cabinet beside me, and he put his arm around my shoulders, and he waited.

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