On my eighteenth birthday, she showed me the dress and told me I would one day alter it and wear it. I thought it was sentimentality. I didn’t realize she was preparing me for something far deeper.
I grew up believing my mother, Elise, died when I was five and that my father had left before I was born. Grandma Rose was my anchor, and I never questioned the story. When I moved away, I still came home every weekend. When Tyler proposed, she wept with joy.
After she passed suddenly, I found the dress in a garment bag. While altering it for my wedding, I felt a small lump in the lining. Inside a hidden pocket was a letter addressed to me.
