“Mom, sit down.”
“I don’t want to sit down.”
“Please.”
I lowered myself into a chair.
Claire sat across from me and folded her hands the way Harold used to when he had rehearsed something difficult.
“After the funeral, I went through Dad’s bank records,” she said.
“You did what?”
“I found cash withdrawals on the same day every month. They went back more than 20 years.”
“So, you decided to investigate your father less than a week after we buried him?”
Her eyes filled.
“I thought he might have been cheating on you. Or gambling. I didn’t know what to think.”
“You thought Harold had another woman?”
“I hired someone to trace the withdrawals. I wanted to know before you did so I could protect you.”
“Protect me from your father?”
“You didn’t see the pattern, Mom. There were 22 years of hidden withdrawals.”
“You should have come to me.”
“You were barely eating. You couldn’t even open the sympathy cards. How was I supposed to tell you I thought Dad might have had another life?”
“Because he didn’t.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I was married to him for 43 years.”
“And you didn’t notice the withdrawals.”
