Chapter 4: Mom's Cardigan

Marco stood on the pale rings in the floor and would not look at me.

"Mom loved Carla," he said at last.

"Mom loved all of us. She didn't hand Carla a gold plate."

"Drop it, Gia."

"You take it out of a box every Sunday and set it by hand. Why?"

"Because Mom asked me to."

"Asked you what?"

"Forget it."

"Marco."

His jaw worked.

Dino had gone to stand by the door with the last box in his arms, and he kept out of it.

Behind him the front door opened, and Carla walked in with her bag on her shoulder.

She had come straight from work in a black blazer and her hoop earrings, and over the blazer she was wearing my mother's grey cardigan.

I saw the dropped button before I saw anything else.

"Oh," Carla said. "You're still here."

"That's my mother's sweater."

She glanced down at it and shrugged.

"She gave it to me. The last time I visited her in the hospital, you were asleep in the waiting room."

"Take it off."

"Gia," Marco said.

"Did she?" I asked him. "Did she give it to her?"

He hesitated for a long time.

"Yes," he said. "She did."

I did not know whether that made it better or worse.

Carla slid the cardigan off her shoulders and held it out by one sleeve.

When I reached for it she let go early, and it fell on the floor between us.

"It's a sweater," she said.

Keep reading free with an account. Start No Seat for Me at This Table from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.