Ik heb een maand lang elke zondag bij het graf van mijn dochter gehuild. Toen zei de beheerder van de begraafplaats tegen me: ‘Huil alsjeblieft niet. Je kent niet de hele waarheid over je dochter.’

“Dad says artists become burdens. Mom says he just worries.”

Below that was one line that cut through me.

“I wish she’d stop trying to make him kinder.”

I sat down hard on the wet grass.

Katherine knelt across from me.

“Dad says artists become burdens.”

“I need to know everything, Katherine,” I said. “Please.”

“Then don’t stop with me,” Katherine said. “Talk to Maya’s teacher. Sadie said everyone knew Maya’s portfolio was the strongest.”

***

That afternoon, I went to Maya’s school with her sketchbook pressed against my chest.

Ms. Alvarez met me in the art room. Paint covered one cuff of her sweater.

“That was always in her hands,” she said.

“I need to know everything, Katherine.”

“Was Maya the front-runner?”

Ms. Alvarez looked away. “By far. The board told me a week before.”

“Was she going to reject it?”

She paused. “Who told you that?”

“Maya did.” I opened the sketchbook to the draft tucked between two pages. “Not out loud. But she wrote it.”

Ms. Alvarez sat down slowly. “She came to me the day before the accident. She was scared.”

“Was she going to reject it?”

“Of losing?”

“No, Jackie. Of winning. Your husband… he made art sound meaningless. He didn’t want her to do it.”

My fingers tightened on the book.

“What did Jordan say to her?”

Ms. Alvarez hesitated.

“Please don’t protect him from me.”