And something inside me went completely dark.
I dropped my luggage.
The gifts crashed onto the floor.
The sound cracked through the kitchen.
Prudence spun around.
The tray trembled in her hands the second she saw me.
Then my mother stepped into the doorway behind her. First her eyes landed on the chocolates scattered across the floor. Then on my face. Then on Sarah sitting there surrounded by scraps and humiliation.
I watched the color drain from her body piece by piece.
First her lips.
Then her cheeks.
Then her hands.
And standing in that filthy back kitchen, I suddenly didn’t know where to look first.
At the woman they had destroyed.
Or at the bl00d that had lied to me for five straight years.