Chapter 38 Scarlett
Scarlett
Scarlett was doing homework when her phone buzzed. It was Ben. She was surprised; normally they texted only in the mornings. She swiped.
Ben: My dad has to come to Connecticut on business
Right before Thanksgiving
He said I can come with him
Scarlett: Wow. That’s awesome
Ben: His meetings are in Westport but I thought maybe we could stay near your house
We can meet before we get the parents involved
Scarlett: Good idea
Ben: What’s your address?
Scarlett hesitated only a moment before typing it in.
Ben: Awesome. I’ll tell him to find a hotel nearby. We can talk about everything and then I’ll come meet your mom. Just don’t say anything to her until after we meet.
Scarlett: K. Can’t wait!
Everything would be out in the open after Ben came to Connecticut. Together they would confront her parents, and then they’d have to tell her everything. She’d have the courage to do it with Ben by her side. She couldn’t wait.
She was dying to tell Olivia but decided against it.
She was hiding a lot from her sister, but maybe it was for the best. Scarlett hadn’t found exactly what she was looking for when she’d searched her mother’s closet, but she had found something.
A letter in her mom’s handwriting. It sort of explained things.
There were times when she heard her mother crying in her room.
She never knew why. She’d taken a picture of the letter with her phone, and she looked at it now, trying to discern its exact meaning.
My darling,
You’ll never read this letter. Fate has seen to that.
But the love that I feel for you transcends all time and space.
Nothing has the power to diminish it. How I wish that I could hold you.
That I could give you all the love that fills my heart so full it feels as though it will burst. All I can promise you is that I won’t forget you.
Though on the outside I may look as though I’ve moved on and begun a new life, inside I will always be missing a part of myself.
I can only hope that one day, against all odds, we may be reunited.
Scarlett wanted to know who her mother had written to.
It was such a sad letter. Why had her mother let go of what sounded like the love of her life?
She’d asked her mom in a roundabout way, but her mom had pretended that there hadn’t been anyone special.
This letter was proof otherwise. And it made sense now, why her mother cried by herself.
It made Scarlett sad too. Did this mean that her mother was unhappy?
Was she pretending when they were all together sailing, or on family vacations?
Did she wish that she were somewhere else, with someone else?
And did her father know about it? She caught him sometimes staring at her mom with a faraway look, like he was trying to figure out what she was thinking.
Did he worry that she was unhappy too? A terrifying thought came to her.
Her mother wrote that she hoped they would be reunited.
What if her mother decided she had to be with this person in the letter? What if she left?